December, for some, flashes by in the blink of an eye! If you are one of those people, you may need to start considering your food plan for the upcoming holiday season.

If you are hosting any gatherings, you may need to plan some meals or dishes ahead of time or even plan some baking recipes to make. At the very least, you will need to go grocery shopping for some more ingredients than normal.

Browse your flyers and take advantage of some current deals! It’s a good idea to check expiry dates while shopping to see if things will last for as long as you need them to! It’s great to get a head start on some of that shopping. It’s especially handy for last-minute or unannounced pop overs from friends or family!

It can be kind of fun to go through fancy or easy recipes and pick out a few to focus on. It’s also kind of fun to hit up Costco and see what new dip you can try or to get a bunch of ingredients in bulk to accommodate your gatherings.

Often, though, you can overlook how you will store it all!

This is the main reason why it’s a good idea to start thinking about what ingredients or foods you will be shopping for now, so that you can clear at least some of the space that you’ll need.

If your freezer is full, yet you want to buy a frozen turkey, you may get the turkey home only to find out that you need to rejig your entire freezer to fit it in!

Start pulling stuff out of your freezer now!

Make it a fun meal planning challenge! Pull out things from the back of your freezer and then come up with a meal for it!

You could do the same for your pantry! Pull out crackers that are old or canned soups. Start using them up to make room for your holiday needs!

Over the next couple weeks, continue to pull food from the freezer and pantry – by the time you need that real estate space, it will be as easy to access as possible! Bonus points if you clear a whole shelf!

Get cracking! Get cooking! Get baking! AND, of course, have fun while you’re at it!

Crank those tunes, and if you have them, get your kids to help with some of the meal ideas, too!

Be sure to check out my other posts about how you can become a Holiday Overachiever!! Get all your holiday preparations done early so that you can put your feet up before the chaos begins!!

Thanks for coming home!