Parties

brights and stripes

We celebrated my mother-in-law’s birthday the Saturday before we left on vacation with a small dinner party hosted at our house. It was just us, my Mom and Dad-in-law and another great couple who are old friends of the family. Since we were in the midst of vacation prepping, I didn’t have a ton of time to plan the dinner party (for shame!) - but I thought I’d prove how you can quickly, cheaply, and easily turn a dinner into a celebration! My husband was doing the cooking (of course. and thank god) - and I asked him to pick up some flowers at Whole Foods while he was doing his shopping. We did a quick run to Target and I bought some crepe paper balls to hang from the chandelier. Not ashamed to say, I'm pretty sure they were $4.00

I made a rough flower arrangement from the flowers he brought home (the two extra stems I ended up snipping off right towards the bloom and putting in votive holders!).

 

We rolled out an old runner my Mom made for our wedding (I always love me some stripes - check out my Pinterest page if you don’t believe me), added some colorful napkins, and voila! Colorful, celebratory and ready for a birthday.

 

With the ridiculously tasty meal my husband prepared and some great wine, and we were ready to roll. We feasted on surf and turf: Lamb porterhouse with fresh pickles, roasted carrot with garlic butter mint glaze, pan roasted shrimp with thyme and lemon, and creamed spinach with nutmeg cayenne and mint from his new iSi whipping siphon.

 

Happy birthday, indeed.

Friday Links: tilapia, chalk, and nostalgia

Things have gotten quite busy for me this week – which is great news, but means I’ve been neglecting my blog! Hope to pick back up again next week. I was invited to a meal at a local caterer this week and though the food was delicious my favorite part was hearing about how green and sustainable they were. I don’t know why I was surprised, but I was. Below is a photo of where they keep tilapia in an aquarium and then use that protein-rich water (cause the fish secrete protein rich stuff…can you tell I’m super scientific?) to grow their food. Awesome.

Oh, and they have bee hives on their roof. Amazing (but no pictures, unfortunately).

Now onto some Friday links…

I’m not usually a very crafty person. Even the simplest of projects intimidates me. But this chalk spray paint (brought to my attention by the ever-so-cool oh happy day) is so rad and looks so easy that I just may have to try it sometime. How awesome is this not only for events (painting a welcome stencil or your party’s logo on your sidewalk ? hellooooo), but for simple at-home fun. I don’t have kids, but I imagine kids would go bananas for this. Heck, my Mom would go bananas for this. I’ll give you all an update when I give it an official whirl.

On a slightly more somber note, Bridal Guide wrote a great post about how to plan a wedding during difficult times. There are a ton of resources for bridal gowns, DIY projects, etiquette, and party favors (on and on and on and on)  - but in my opinion not enough for people dealing with tough times. So I was really glad to see this out there. Frankly, it’s a good read for anyone cause it brings a whole lot of perspective. With Thanksgiving around the corner, that’s never a bad thing.

Had to throw in one more super-random link – I just heard through the grapevine that Free To Be…You And Me is FORTY YEARS OLD. Can’t believe it. But it inspired me to revisit the album, which in turn made me smile like nobody's business. Here’s a little sampling, and an awesome article on the making-of. Go listen, read, get happy, and feel old. Oh, and if you have no idea what I'm talking about, read the article anyway and be sad that your parents weren't hippies.

a spicy gathering

What I love about owning a home is being able to entertain on a whim. And what I love about having the amazing husband I have is being able to eat all of his delicious food. We had an impromptu gathering the other evening - nothing super-special, just the two of us and my in-laws watching some Redskins. But it FELT more special than that because my husband is great at getting inspired by food and sharing that food with others (oh yeah, and cooking the food). Our gatherings always seem to start with him wanting to make something and share it. I think it's so key to any evening, any event, any party.

This time, it started with the chili. He had the urge to make chili and it had to be done. Home-made chili powder, beef cubed himself, a dash of Sol beer. YES. Please.

 

Chili

fixings

 

While at the grocery store we realized we really wanted bloody marys as well. So we picked up the fixings and had those ready to go when the in-laws arrived. I was the one who reminded him to use his grandmother's fabulous glasses. And to rim those glasses with Old Bay (amazing and delicious if you've never tried it. You'll never go back).

 

Bloody Mary

 

a spicy evening, for sure

 

CHILI

The morning after

The site has launched! I'm so excited - and very happy you're here! For my first blog post I thought I’d welcome you all by giving you a glimpse into where I come from: one of my first and favorite party memories.
I lived in Paris, France between the ages of 3 and 6. While there, my mother lived with some friends in a chateau about 20 miles west of Paris. The Chateau du Barry was located in Louveciennes, France. It was named after Mme. du Barry, a famous mistress of Louis XV, who entertained her royal lover and many aristocratic friends at this chateau, which was a short coach-ride from the main Versailles court. And no, I’m not making this up.

In my old age, I’m sure I glamorize this experience a fair amount. To keep it real, there basically wasn’t any heat, so I remember being freezing most of the time and layering my mom’s massive sweatshirts over our clothes to keep warm (that's me, in the middle, between my two older sisters).
That being said, this place was pretty magical, especially for a little girl who spent her weekdays in the city. There were secret passageways. There was a pony and a german shepherd. The architecture, even to a 4 year old, was pretty impressive and often overwhelming. And then there were the parties.
The fellow residents, all friends of my mother’s, would throw parties often (how could you NOT if you lived in a freakin chateau?!). Since the 1980’s were not the age of digital photography, I have very few photos of that time, but I have included what I could find. This particular soiree was a spring celebration - everyone was asked to wear white, and my mother helped make the floral “couronnes” out of colored paper for everyone to wear. None of the other residents had children, so the parties themselves were super-glamorous, adult affairs to us little girls.
But. My favorite part was the morning after. The morning belonged to just us three kids and was our own mini-celebration. My sisters and I would wake up super early and tip-toe down the grand, winding marble staircase to the party aftermath. There, all alone (as I now understand, most of the adults were sleeping off their hangovers), we’d pick our way through the massive, ancient rooms and their overflowing ashtrays and hundreds of empty cups to dine on the party leftovers for an extra-special breakfast feast of our own. Bite of slightly stale but tasty chocolate cake from this room, taste of cheese and crackers in that room. And naughtiest of all, sips of flat champagne.
To me, this is always the greatest of party memories because it’s a reminder that there’s a story to tell in the leftovers. Every empty cup, cracker crumb, wine stain, and half-eaten cake was a mystery to me as a child, but an obvious clue that a great, excessive celebration had been had - and the fact that no cleaning up had been done, no evidence wiped away, meant that it had really been a party. Our imaginations would run wild as we nibbled our way through the unhealthiest - but greatest - of breakfasts.
Leftovers
So I encourage you (and provide a much-needed reminder to my type-A self) to go to bed without cleaning up. Wake up the next morning and enjoy the evidence... before you clean it all up and start planning your next bash.