I recently stopped in at Pier 1 and was totally taken with some adorable fall accent plates. So I couldn’t resist buying them for an intimate family dinner I was hosting. The accent plates, though fantastic, really needed to accompany dinner plates, so I had to buy some of those too. Then I realized I needed glassware to go with it all, and of course I needed napkins, placemats, and Oh silverware also…. OK I may have gotten a little carried away but I had so much fun mixing, matching and creating an original and beautiful table setting that I’m tempted to go back to the store and do something totally different for my Christmas dinner table!  

Once I started down the table setting path I couldn’t stop myself and began looking for centerpiece inspiration on…you guessed it, Pinterest. I pinned a ton of beautiful ideas but settled on a version of this one. I loved the simplicity of the centerpiece and the fall harvest idea it inspired in me. I’m a huge fan of Thanksgiving for many reasons not least of which, it is the celebration of abundance and the showing of gratitude for that abundance. But this year I’ve decided to forgo my traditional hosting of the family gathering and made dinner reservations instead. Not only does my birthday fall on the holiday but I am also 1,000 days pregnant (or at least it feels like it) and living in a rental house while I finish up work on the new TV show I’m filming for CBS. I figured I had more than enough on my plate and trying to be the “hostess with the mostess” over the Thanksgiving holiday was going to leave me totally drained, cranky and exhausted. So this little family dinner I decided to throw was really my only opportunity to get my Thanksgiving hosting fix in but on a scale I could easily manage with energy to spare. I’m guessing there are plenty of other overwhelmed hosts out there so I’ll be publishing a “Letting myself off the Hook” post in the next couple of weeks to hopefully help inspire those of you who just don’t have the energy to plan, cook, decorate and entertain this Holiday season, but still want to do something special to celebrate. But that’s for another day, back to my family harvest dinner!

So once I chose the perfect table setting and settled on a centerpiece idea I loved I planned the menu. I recently discovered the Feast Kitchen app and it’s pretty amazing. Not only are the recipes delicious and easy to follow they also include instruction videos for everything from how to properly chop an onion to segmenting citrus. Another amazing feature of the app is the shopping list. Once you’ve chosen a recipe or two you can generate a grocery list of the ingredients needed for that recipe right within the app. It’s pretty genius and takes a ton of the work out of menu planning!

I kinda wish every dinner party could come together as simply and beautifully as this one did. It took me just a few hours to prep, plan and set the whole thing up. Even the meal was relatively easy and didn’t require hours of effort. If only I could guarantee as seamless, easy and elegant a Thanksgiving gathering I just might forgo the dinner reservations and host it after all. But we all know Thanksgiving dinner is rarely qualified as an easy, seamless affair! This year I’ll be thankful I pulled off this perfect harvest family dinner and keep the reservations!

• Dinner Plates
• Chargers
• Placemats
• Silverware
• Napkins
• Napkin Rings
• Glasses
• Martini Glasses

• Rutabaga and Apple Mash
• Brussels Sprout Salad
• Roasted Leg of Lamb 
• Dessert