Ready to plan a party for the holiday with dinner and dessert recipes?

With the holiday season here, it’s time to party or have lots of family and friends over and I’ve got some great recipes for dinner and desserts to share with you.  This is the last part of my Time To Party Plan series.

The first part I talked about how to get ready for the holidays and plenty of guests and friends.  Next up, we looked at appetizers and drinks for your parties and then snacks and lunches.  This Time To Party–Dinner and Desserts post, we’ll take a look at a few ways to lower the costs of your gatherings or parties.  I’ve also included some great recipes for dinners and desserts.

                    Crockpot Cranberry Turkey Breast
By Jessica with Together As Family

FOUR WAYS TO LOWER YOUR COSTS

**Plan before Shopping (Pssst, use pinterest)

**Do Some Comparison Shopping

**Make up your list(s) to coincide with your regular shopping trips

**Don’t Go To Regular Stores

**Get Everyone Involved and Have Fun

PLAN BEFORE SHOPPING

First thing to do is totally plan out your party.  That means more than just your menu.  Plan out what theme you are going for, your menu, every item needed for that menu, favors, decorations, plates, napkins, etc.

Include items you already have.  Put those items on your list and check mark as you already have them.  Putting them on your master list, you won’t have to wonder at the store if you have that item or not.  You will already know; therefore saving you money.

Sweet Potato Turkey Chili 
By Shuang Shuang with Shuang’s Kitchen Sink

One of the main reasons for planning is to save you money.  For every item you already have, you save.  If an item is on your list, you know what you need and when you come across something else at the store, you know you don’t need to get it.  More money saved.  Planning cuts down on impulse buying.

Use Pinterest to help you with your planning.  Its a good source to check out theme ideas, decorations or even games for you and your guests to play.

No Bake Apple Pie Cheesecake
By My Food and Family

DO SOME COMPARISON SHOPPING

Look in the sales ads you’ve got for the week or go online.  Most stores will tell you online what is on sale.  Don’t forget checking out Amazon as it might be cheaper to get some of the things needed from them, especially if you are on their Prime program.

Looking at the store ads may also help you determine what foods to make for your gathering.  Look at the meats to see what’s on sale.  Doing one big main dish is often cheaper than making everyone steaks.  And just because you may want to aim to save as much as you can, that doesn’t mean you are cheap.  In my book, it’s just everyday smart.  If you did something like Chili or tacos, this can be relatively inexpensive, delicious and very easy to get ready ahead of time.

Southwest Chicken Skillet
By Tiffany with Living Sweet Moments

MAKE UP SECONDARY LISTS

When you know you are going out to a specific store that you can get some of your needed party items, make a secondary list for those items.  Once you have them home, mark them off your master list.  You can do all the shopping at once if that’s what you prefer, while others don’t have time to do that.  For instance, its easier for me to stop at some of the stores I would need on my way home from work.

Other stores, I may need to get something from are in the opposite direction, so I know I would be making another trip.  But, I coincide these trips to regular trips I would be making anyway so as not to waste extra time.

DON’T GO TO THE REGULAR STORES THAT YOU USUALLY GO TO

If your regular stores have the best prices or are closer to home, go for it.  But don’t forget about your neighborhood places, like drugstores and dollar stores.  Sometimes I can get seasonal items or sodas cheaper at my neighborhood drugstore than my usual grocery store. 

And for a party, I definitely would hit the Dollar Store for paper items or things I can use for decorations or make decorations with.  Some Dollar Stores are so big and well stocked, you may find favors there along with some types of foods you need.

Grandma’s Chocolate Truffle
By Ashton with Something Swanky

GETTING READY FOR THE BIG EVENT

Set-up Food Stations or “bars”—this makes things easy.  This type of eating/party plan is easy to set-up and leaves plenty of time for you to mingle with your guests and enjoy yourself too.  There are plenty of ideas if you go this route.

Setting-up a table in different places in your entertainment area encourages your guests to mingle.  Any food or drink station usually gets people chatting with each other.  Different tables to set-up could be:  Main dish, snacks, drinks and desserts

Have fun with your stations.  For your main dish think about a potato bar, taco station, pasta station, chili station, soup/salad bar or sandwich station.  You provide all the fixins and your guests can make their own food the way they want or like it.

Pumpkin Crunch Cake
By Aimee with Shugary Sweets

You can handle the drink bar however you want.   Alcohol or no alcohol.  Again, if you want to save money, make up a signature punch.  This way you only need one type of alcohol and you can mix one batch up for the non-drinkers and kiddos and then the other batch can be for those that want the alcohol.  See my Time to Party, Part Two, where I share several suggestions for types of holiday drinks.

INVITATIONS

Most people don’t really send out paper invites these days and I have to be honest.  I don’t mind when I get an invitation through email or text.  I would just be throwing out the paper invite anyway, once I put the event in my calendar.

You can get as creative as you want with your invitations.  I use Canva.com.  Below I’ve shown you what a template looks like and what the end product looks like that I created.  It took about 15 minutes and I used a template made for another type of invite.  Then I can download the invitation and send it to my guests when I’m ready.  And I’ll have the copy already saved to help remember what I did when I look back the next time.  (You can do this with your Christmas cards too)

Use canva.com or picmonkey.com to make your invitations.  It’s free and saves you buying the invites and stamps.  Just make your invitation to match your theme and email or text them to all your friends and family.

ONE LAST THING TO MAKE YOUR PARTY COMPLETE

How can anyone have a party without some good music.  I created a playlist for you that should hit on something for everyone to like.  The list should provide you with about two hours of tunes.  I just downloaded all the songs on my prime account and I’m set.

There you have it–4 posts that will help you get through the holiday season with less stress, hopefully saving you some money and allow you to enjoy the season along with your friends and family.

Happy Holidays to You and Yours!

Stay Awesome

Cher

Revelant Reading

Holiday Plants that can Harm Your Pets
Time to Party
Time to Party Lunch and Snacks
Time to Party-Appetizers and Drinks

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