Mini Rant

[NicoleLJ]

Ok a huge pet peeve of mine is when my kids or fiance calls me up 3 hours before supper is to be on the table to say they invited one of their buddies at the last minute. To be clear I love to have people over for meals. Really do. But I tell them to give me at least one days notice so I can ensure there is always enough. Seems Doug can't get this little notion through his head. Called me up at quarter after 4 to tell me a buddy from work is coming for dinner. Dinner is scheduled to be on the table at 6:15. He is lucky I already had enough out to make an extra plate. But still frustrated about it. Anyone else deal with this issue? How do you approach it? And yes we have talked about giving me notice, doesn't seem to sink in.

OK rant over. Feel much better. Off to finish making dinner.

[Cataholic]

This hasn't happened to me yet, but I can see how frustating it could be. You don't want to be rude, yet you don't want to look like you can't manage a dinner either.

For the kids, I could just say, "nope, not tonight". For your SO...prolly doesn't work.

[Daisy and Delilah]

Big problem for me. If I cook a ton of food I might be able to work with it. I hate surprises like that though. I live alone now but that happened to me many times in the past. I never got used to it.

I would sit down and have another talk about how stressful it is for you. Good luck.

[Karen]

We never knew, growing up, how many people were going to be present for a particular meal for the most part, just made plenty to go around.

The funniest one was my sister's friend Nancy - she was a very sheltered only child of a very quiet couple, so when she was over our house for dinner, she never ate much anyway, she was too busy laughing at our normal dinner table routine!

[Lady's Human]

Cook enough so you have leftovers (besides, if it's worth cooking, it's worth cooking extra), and the extra odd body won't matter. (3 Hours is more notice than we normally ever gave at home, being that it takes me about 1/2 hours to an hour to cook dinner, doesn't seem like that big a deal?)

[Catlady711]

He is lucky I already had enough out to make an extra plate.

That's the problem right there. His buddy is still getting the meal and your hubby is happy. It's never going to sink in if it always works out.

My thoughts are that you have 3 choices:

1) always make a bit extra just in case, and you can use any leftovers for lunch.

2) appologize profusely in front of hubby and guest(s) when there isn't enough food for the unannounced, or short notice buddy, hubby might get the hint then.

3) only fix meals that require less time to make so that 3 hours would be more than enough time to prepare a meal if guests have been added.