November Begins and With it the Festive Season

Harvest pumpkin salt and pepper shakers, at Pier 1.com

Happy first day of November! Hope you had a fun Halloween last night! Sadly, I didn’t get any trick-or-treaters this year, but I enjoyed a quiet evening at home with my boyfriend (who cooked dinner for us!) my fireplace, and a viewing of “Practical Magic.” (He wasn’t a fan, so I owe him his choice of a movie tonight).

Now it’s November. How the year flies by! Thanksgiving is 27 days away, and Christmas is 53 days away. Think about things you might want to get done this month regarding these upcoming holidays. It will all depend upon how much you entertain (or not), how big and busy your family is, and what your personal priorities for the month ahead are.

This month I’m working hard to get my house ready for the festive season ahead. I really enjoy hosting parties, connecting people and helping people who are new to town make some friends. I plan to host dinner parties, birthday parties, Family Dinner nights, movie nights, a cocktail party or two (or let’s face it, three or four). And every year I host a nice cozy “Friendsgiving.”

I’ll need my kitchen in top working order (and I’ll need to keep it well organized and maintained as the month progresses). I’ll need my downstairs “family room” set up as a bar – I like to sort of force guests to mingle by making them go downstairs to serve themselves drinks.

With visiting relatives in mind, or tipsy friends, or wine-drinking movie-watching slumber parties coming up, both of my guest bedrooms need to be comfy, tidy and cozy. I want my guests to be comfortable in a luxurious, well-appointed, uncluttered and warm guest room. Are you anticipating overnight guests this fall? Perhaps you’d like to follow along with these cleaning projects in your own home.

I’ll make a major push to clean and organize the house (emphasizing on the kitchen) this month. That will leave my December more freed up for Christmas shopping, holiday parties, and festive activities. (I’ll still have to clean and organize in December, but mostly it will be about maintaining the lovely home I created in November).

QUICK THINGS TO DO TODAY:

Test and change out batteries in the flashlights you keep in your purse, car, bedside table, etc.
Pay rent/mortgage and bills.
Look over your calendar for upcoming birthdays during November. Take time this week to sit down and write birthday greeting cards, prepare them for mailing; send gifts; or send flowers to anybody on your list for this week.
Make doctor, dentist, salon, groomer and vet appointments for yourself, family members and your pets for the upcoming month.
Are you thinking of attending any plays, musicals, concerts or symphonies this autumn and winter? Make your plans and buy tickets now if you haven’t yet.
Remove any Halloween decorations, keeping up Thanksgiving and fall themed ones (unless you’re the type of person who enjoys having Halloween decor out for months or year-round!) Store your decorations safely away in a well-marked box or Sterilite tub. Leave anything that still looks autumn-related: my pumpkins are staying out, for example. Keep burning your Halloween candles until they are used up – then we’ll have an excuse to go shopping for new autumn and Christmas candles!
It’s recommended that we change our smoke detector/carbon monoxide detector batteries now, during the fall time change (coming up November 3).
I also like to flip, vacuum and rotate my mattresses so they for sure get that done twice per year.
Are you participating in NaNoWriMo? Let me know in the comments below!
Do you have your Thanksgiving hosting or travel plans set and confirmed?

TODAY’S PROJECT: Living Room

Navy Milani Loveseat, from Pier 1 Imports

Tonight is Date Night, so I won’t be able to get any projects done after 5 pm. So this afternoon I’ll take an hour or so off of work (I work for myself at home) to work on freshening my upstairs “formal” living room. Because this is the most light-filled room of the house, it’s our favorite room and gets used quite a bit. I use this room in the mornings to drink tea, read magazines, sort mail, pay bills, and watch a little bit of the news while consuming caffeine and trying to wake up. On rainy afternoons I might light a fire and watch a recorded cooking show or something light on Netflix while I’m taking a break from my work or eating a late lunch. In the evenings, we might catch up on the news and eat dinner in this comfy room rather than at the dining table.

Besides the dining room, this is the main room I entertain in. When guests come over, I spread appetizers and drinks on the coffee table, play music on the living room stereo, light candles on the mantel, and light a fire in the fireplace. Guests are welcomed into this room while they wait for dinner to be served. They do tend to hover in my small kitchen, which makes me feel really stressed out. I always hope that appetizers will lure them into relaxing in the living room instead of crowding into the kitchen!

Because I do entertain so very often, I need this room to always be ready to go at a moment’s notice: tidy, looking cozy, neat and clean. (I will admit that I often rush upstairs right before a cocktail party to hide the cluttery pile of mail and magazines that magically accumulates on my coffee table!)

Tiffany-Style Folding Stained Glass Fireplace Screen, from Chloe Lighting, via Amazon

Tonight I plan to:

Wash the living room windows thoroughly, take down my orange Halloween lights and remove the tape used to hold them up
Watch the news or listen to music while I work, to make my task more pleasant. Can’t hurt to sashay around cleaning with a glass of wine in one hand, either!
Clean ashes out of the fireplace and replenish the supply of firewood and Duraflames I keep next to it. I’ll keep an eye on my supply of fireplace matches and regular matches, too. I love burning a fire every night in autumn and winter!
Next I will dust the fireplace mantel, two bookshelves, coffee table, two side tables, all the baseboards and four windowsills.
I’ll move the couch, coffee table, mail table and end tables and vacuum under them. I also need to vacuum both of my couches – I see evidence that a naughty black doggie has been sneaking onto the furniture for naps!
My living room curtains were laundered during Spring Cleaning, so I will just Febreze them and leave them alone.
The lamp needs dusting, and I’ll remove spent tea light candles from their votives spread around the room, replacing them with fresh ones.
I keep a box of Kleenex in this room, and need to check to see if it needs replenishing.
For a finishing touch, I’ll put a bowl of Satsuma oranges on the coffee table. My dogs seem to leave them alone, and they’ll make the room smell nice. I’ll fluff the decorative pillows (putting away the Halloween ones and swapping out for autumn and Thanksgiving themed pillows), refold the throws we keep on the couches, and be ready to settle in late tonight with hot cocoa and the current book I’m reading!

LOVELY BLOGS: 36 Eggs

I’m a big fan of this literary-based cooking and baking site! The authors just released “The Little Women Cookbook” and they often write about foods from lovely books such as Anne of Green Gables. The blog has been focusing a lot on Victorian-era and Little Women-themed content lately. Check out their nice Christmas recipes section while you’re here!

https://36eggs.com/

MY NEW BLOG AND YOUTUBE CHANNEL: Cookbook Divas

In case I’m not running enough blogs to neglect on a regular basis, I got super excited about cookbooks and started up Cookbook Divas. It’s a YouTube channel where I look through and review my vintage cookbooks as well as brand new recent cookbooks. I’ve gotten so comfortable on video from doing it for my other blogs, that I decided what the heck, I’d go for it. Check it out!

http://www.cookbookdivas.com/

Cookbook Divas Channel on YouTube