Large Family Weekends for Dummies

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Well it’s officially time that summer is passing and we may get to some cooler weather soon. I have to admit that while I am definitely a cold weather loving gal, I will miss this summer. I’ve been in the pool constantly and that has led to some relaxing evenings and nice memories with the boys.

This past weekend we spent a lot of pool time with the kids who came home for Labor Day. Our two married, pregnant daughters came with their families and most of our other kids who live just a few hours away came home and we had a grand time. We were either swimming, eating, playing games or staring at the one year old granddaughter. We will all just sit and watch her like she’s a zoo animal. Her life is about to change dramatically when these two new babies come along! We will have new things to stare at in awe and wonder.

I know I’ve said it before, but its so strange to only have 3 kids at home. Life sure is different than it was when all 9 of them needed help and teaching and guidance. Now we just get to just sit back and watch the older ones make their mistakes and learn from the hard times of life, but we don’t have to get all wrapped up in their issues. And as much as we LOVE their visits we also love having the house back to our new normal. And the new grocery budget isn’t too bad either when you don’t have to feed 11 people, many of them hungry teenagers. With the three boys at home its easier, that’s for sure.

I do miss it though….the days when we were all together. One at a time they walked out the door after the weekend was over and each one took a little piece of my heart with them. It’s strange, but also it’s OK. You get used to it and even thankful for the new heart that’s walking around in other places. God takes care of it all.

Like I mentioned, we played a LOT of games. We love our games. This past weekend we played “Battle of the Sexes,” “Oodles,” and “Balderdash.” I think everyone would vote to play these games again. There was a lot of laughing and a little stiff competition…..we don’t take these thing lightly around here.

Then there was the food. First of all y’all may know I am meal-planning challenged. I don’t like cooking and I especially don’t like missing time with my family because I have to be in the kitchen working. Plus my kids have a variety of food allergies from dairy to gluten to preferring not to eat sugar. food planning and prep always overwhelms me on these weekends with large crowds, so I came up with a meal list for each day and prepped all of the food before everyone arrived. We had 3 nights of dinners so I did tacos, spaghetti (in the instant pot) and Chicken Monterrey. I have two Instant Pots so I could make one with gluten free pasta. We put a green salad with each meal and it was pretty easy! The Chicken Monterrey is a family fave. Since it has dairy in it I made that on the night my dairy free kid wasn’t going to be here.

For lunches I did a charcuterie board. I wasn’t sure how this would go over since I’ve never done anything like it. But it was a big hit. And it was so easy to put together and then do again the next day with what was left. Plus that gave us lots of healthy snacks throughout the weekend.

I got my little Disney bowl when we went to Florida over the summer. It’s from their new home décor line and I loved using the bowls this weekend. They added a little hint of magic.

Of course all my planning wasn’t without its flaws. For one thing, I got two meats for the tray and when I went to put it all together I couldn’t find one of them. I finally located it sitting out on a table under a bunch of chips where it had never been put in the fridge from the day before. Trash. Also I had two kinds of gluten-free crackers and one type of wheat cracker, but because I wanted to be all fancy I got some that I’d never tasted before. As I was setting it all up I tried one of the wheat crackers and they were awful….hard and tasteless. I grabbed a block of cream cheese leftover from the Chicken Monterrey and set it out to go with the hard, dry crackers and pretended like it was planned.

Bam! Life is full of opportunities to adapt.

And now we are washing all of the sheets and prepping for the next full weekend we have coming up. It’s the annual Forge Conference and we love getting to see all of these wonderful friends who come once a year for this (I’m pretty sure there’s still time to register if you want to go!). Our house will be overflowing, but at least I don’t have to feed them for every meal. I just have to make sure we have plenty of healthy breakfast options and late night snacks and they do their own thing for the other meals. That much I can do without being overwhelmed. And we love hosting friends, old and new, so we’re all looking forward to it (plus I get to see a couple of my older kids again!).

I’ve been diffusing my essential oils in all the rooms to make them smell nice and putting little baskets of necessities together for the guests this coming weekend. I like to add peppermint oil, lavender, some water bottles, tissues, breath mints and other small helps for anything they might need.

And who knows, maybe I’ll make another charcuterie board since the one I made last weekend was such a hit and didn’t require cooking. Can you do that for breakfast? I feel like I could make that work!

Have a happy September! Hop over to my Facebook page and let me know what you’ve got on the calendar for the month! Or if you have any easy, healthy breakfast ideas for a crowd!