Never too soon for another party.
How about a soup and salad "homey" party?
Ham and bean soup, turkey veggie and noodles...and maybe that 7 layer salad and a tower of cupcakes made with 3 different cakes....each person's favorite...unless everyone prefers chocolate
Linda C

I love that idea about cupcakes to get everyone's favorite! Lindac always knows what to do.

i'm too tired to make different cupcakes.

Well, I've got the soup made and frozen (split pea and ham), and I've made the broth for a turkey something soup.

Haven't figured out the cake yet, unless I buy ready made, a tower would be too many for us. Maybe a cake covered in snowy coconut???

Linda, what is the 7 layer salad you are referring to, please?

The soups sound great-maybe make some cheddar beer biscuits to go with the soups. For cake..why not break from the traditional & have a Boston Cream Cake? I make them 2 different ways:

(1) Bake a 2 layer yellow cake (mix is fine). When cooled-make sure you cut the tops off so each layer is level.

Make up a large box of vanilla pudding-the cooked kind (Jello)-cut back on the milk so it's a bit thicker when cooked. Let cool completely in fridge, then spread on the bottom layer. Add the top layer.

Here's where the two can differ:
For the icing/top layer..either spread a can of cherry pie filling all over the top & let drip down the sides...OR melt Milk Chocolate chips (per directions on the bag) and pour over the top of the cake. Place in fridge until choc is set. You can then take a can of whipped topping & squirt a little candleholders around the cake's edges to place candles in them.
.

Thanks all for the ideas...here's how simple and easy it turned out:

Soup and grilled cheese sandwiches, birthday cake dessert.

Made split pea and ham soup in the pressure cooker the day b4.

Had the bakery at Target supercenter slice up a loaf of tuscany style dense white bread and one of cheddar cheese bread, and bought a couple packages of pre-sliced cheddar cheese, a gallon of tea.

I found an interesting "new" boxed cake mix from Duncan Hines called "Decadent Carrot Cake" with real carrot and raisins, so I opted for that, and threw in some chopped pecans. Made my own cream cheese frosting and toasted coconut to sprinkle on top. That was easy enough!

I warmed the soup in my crock pot, and got out the sterling ladle from Grandma's silver chest! OH the grilled cheese sandwiches were tres' magnifique, and so simple! I slathered the bread slices with plenty of softened unsalted butter butter, and filled them with a few layers of the cheese and some fresh tomato slices. Onto my big breakfast griddle they went, and I placed a heavy frying pan atop them to weight them down while they grilled....this step had everyone wondering why.....then I flipped them to grill the other side. Sliced em' in half, plattered them up, and served them with the hot soup, mini-dill pickles and potato chips!

The soup was delicious, (we all love split pea, anyway) but the simple grilled cheese sandwiches were devine!

The weight of the pan on top, helped the thick slices of bread to deeply absorb all the butter, rendering them golden brown, with wonderfully toasty, crispy crusts. The cheese melted out and over the crusts just a bit in places, and left each sandwich with a bit of fried cheese "cling on", crispy and darkened where it met the grill! The tomato tucked inside was tender and just offset all the cheese perfectly!

After that, we enjoyed the cake with some Hagen Das vanilla ice cream, and opened birthday presents!

OK, now that the birthdays are accounted for, I'm headed for Christmas!!!

Hi Acey,
The upcoming festive season and my kid's birthday on 12/3. There can't be a better combination of celebrations.

I tried out the Carrot Cake recipe and we (my husband who likes to keep poking his nose in the wok, and yours truly) went a step further and cut the cake in the middle horizontally and filled it up with strawberry jam and some cream. We also added roasted hazel nuts, tasted really good.

We gave paper scientist coats to my son Dave's friends with plastic specs which made the tiny tots look like lil Einsteins.

Also we called the
Mad Science guys to further add to the fun. Mad scientist Bob arrived with two big crates, some buckets, some bags and a couple of ice chests. Scientist Bob took out some bottles, gloves and other scientific glassware and set them up on a platform. In a glass flask Bob began mixing a bright green potion. He then reached in a bag and pulled out some magical little white rocks and just before he dropped them into the the potion flask, he started to laugh - shouting ..Eureka of course with the clothes on. He dropped them in the water and it started to smoke, steam and bubble.

All of us had the most fantastic evening and I can recommend Mad Science for birthday parties any time.