Buy a turkey. Thaw it (if it's frozen). Make stuffing. Lots of options here, so go with your favorite. Stuff the turkey. Smear the skin with butter. Put it in the oven.
After a while peel potatoes. Around the time you think the turkey is done start boiling the potatoes. When the turkey is done (I'm very fond of the pop-up thermometers to help me out here) take it out of the oven. It will need a half hour or so to cool. At some point take the stuffing out of the bird. And yes, I'm hoping you actually ignored the bullshit about how stuffing in the turkey is deadly. Stuffing needs to absorb the juices from the turkey to be truly edible.
Okay, at some point you've organized whatever other vegetables you like. Me, I open a can of yams and warm them up. I also do peas in a pot on top of the stove. I'll leave other veggies up to you.
Mashed potatoes. Boil peeled (although peeling is somewhat optional) potatoes that have been cut into chunks until they are done. This takes under thirty minutes. Not rocket science. Drain. Using a ricer (if you don't know what that is, do a small amount of research; trust me, it will pay off) to rice the potatoes. Add butter, milk (I use half and half. Do NOT waste skim milk here) and some cream cheese. NOT sour cream. Trust me, you don't want the sour cream taste in your Thanksgiving potatoes. The ricer is a more than adequate tool to mash the potatoes. I suppose, if you're somewhat OCD, you can use an electric mixer, but why bother? Perhaps the most important thing is that once you've mashed the potatoes, DO NOT cover them. That makes potato glue. Leave them uncovered. If they got done sooner than you'd expected, don't worry. This is why god created microwave ovens. If need be, heat the potatoes up in the microwave before putting on the table.
After about thirty minutes the turkey is ready to carve. Assign someone to that task. They don't need to be very good at it, just able to disassemble the turkey with a knife. Put the carved turkey on a platter. Don't forget to make gravy. That's not at all hard. Just drain off the obvious grease from the baked turkey, make a roux of butter and flower, add chicken or turkey broth (which is generally available around Thanksgiving) and voila! Turkey gravy! Hopefully you have appropriate serving dishes for the stuffing, gravy, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, peas, and whatever other veggies you like.
The last three years of my marriage I hosted Thanksgiving dinner at our house. I baked the turkey, stuffing, and mashed potatoes. The twenty or so people who came over all felt guilty that I was doing so much work. To me, it didn't feel like a lot of work. I let others bring various side dishes and bottles of wine and it was a wonderful feast.
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