Meal Plans Week of 12-20-09 and 12-27-09

We're in the home stretch now.  Only a few days until Christmas!  And with all of the parties and traveling we'll be doing I figured I'd do a lot of planning up front.  So I've got things planned out for the rest of the month.  Our travel starts today.  We're heading to Flushing for my nephew's baptism.  We'll stay for church and a potluck and then come home in the afternoon.  Wed. is Kindermusik in the morning, and we're celebrating Christmas as a family in the evening.  Thursday will be packing and baking.  I'm hoping to do most of the packing for both upcoming trips since we won't have a lot of time inbetween.  Friday morning we'll be at church.  In the afternoon we're heading to Grand Blanc to celebrate Christmas with extended family.  We'll stay overnight and celebrate with my family the next morning.  Then come home in the afternoon.  Sunday is church, unpack, repack...relax? :P  Then we leave for WI Monday morning.  We'll come home Thursday evening.  And that pretty much covers December!  Hopefully we'll have a nice relaxing New Year's Day as a family after all of the parties and travel.  I'm not 100% sure on my meal plans for New Year's Day.  Maybe I can think about that while I'm in the car for hours :P  And Jan. 2 I might be going out with friends.  Still working on plans.  If not maybe we'll go out as a family.  We haven't done that in a LONG time.

As always, I've been doing lots of baking for Christmas.  Last week I made a couple more batches of  chocolate covered pretzels, some cherry square bars, homemade whole wheat soft pretzels and blueberry jubilee (for today's potluck).  This week I'll be making food for 3 parties.  First is our own.  I'm not 100% sure on all of the details of our meal yet.  I'm still trying to decide if I should make all of the sides I came up with.  And I have to figure out what kind of pork I'm making (tenderloin, roast?).  I'd love to make ham, but we're having ham at all of our other parties.  So I decided to do something different.  We'll have our traditional peppermint ice cream and homemae hot fudge for dessert.  And Justin wants to try alcoholic egg nog this year (tradition from his family to drink egg nog while opening presents).  I don't like the non-alcholic stuff, so I don't expect to like this either.  But I suppose I'll at least try it :P  For the extended family party I am in charge of dessert.  I have most of it made already.  I just have to make a turtle cheesecake yet on Thursday.  And for the immediate family party we are having a brunch.  I am making some kind of muffin or scone (need to decide!) and bringing some homemade jam and some kind of fruit.  I don't think I have to worry about staying busy this week :P  At least I did get all of my gift wrapping done yesterday.  One more thing to check off the list.

Hopefully I'll still be able to get in my end of month post/monthly goals post for Jan. on time.  But if not it'll come within the first few days of the start of Jan.

So, on to the meals.

S - (baptism...in Flint/traveling most of the day) - potluck...I'm bringing blueberry jubilee (lunch), leftover pea soup (me), leftover korean bbq (Justin) (dinner)
M - (Meijer, make choc. covered pb crackers, make and freeze scones, put away laundry, start packing) - chicken and veggie stir fry over brown rice
T - (make choc. covered pb crackers, pack, make seafoam salad) - cashew avocado turkey salad, mini pumpkin scones, peas
W - (laundry, KM, pack, our Christmas dinner and gifts) - pork, scalloped potatoes, squash, green beans, baked beans, sea foam salad (dinner); egg nog, peppermint ice cream w/ homemade hot fudge (dessert)
Th - (make cheesecake, prep fruit for Sat., pack for 2 trips) - leftovers from Wed.
F - (church, nursery, quick, easy lunch before getting in the car, family party in GB w/ extended family) - leftovers from Wed. (lunch); dinner - each part of the meal is being made by a different family.  I'm making dessert - turtle cheesecake, Christmas cookies, chocolate covered pretzels, cherry square bars, dutch apple pie
S - (family party in GB w/ immediate family, travel home, unpack, repack) - brunch...I'm bringing pumpkin scones, apple butter or cherry jam, fresh fruit; baked egg puffs??? (just realized we're having eggs for lunch...may have to rethink this), peas, bread, pearsauce (dinner)...maybe grilled cheese and chicken lentil soup (from freezer) sandwich ring, seafoam salad, baked beans, peas, pineapple, grapes (mostly leftovers)

S - (church, pack) - egg casserole, pumpkin scone (Justin), misc. (me), ham, veggies (Rebecca) (lunch); chicken lentil stew, bread and/or grilled cheese (dinner)
M - (leave for WI in the morning, lunch on the road, dinner in WI) - pork on a bun, chips, yogurt, fruit (lunch); mexican lasagna (dinner)
T,W - WI
Th - (travel home from WI, leave in the morning, lunch on the road) - misc. for dinner...order pizza, something from the freezer, pb and j, grilled cheese, egg puffs
F - (laundry, clean, get caught up) - pumpkin pasta, veggies
S - out w/ friends?, out to eat as a family?