What a weekend. Somehow I saw no problems with cooking dinner for my entire family, let alone inviting them all into my apartment. And for that, I’ve apologized to Lisa.
!@(images/familydinner0503/lisa.jpg:R popimg: “Lisa enjoys the fruit of her labors”)Okay, it really wasn’t that bad. But it really was that tiring. A lot of it had to do with a very stressful week at work that has me working numerous late nights (including the never-to-be-recounted evening of last Thursday). By the time Friday rolled around and our real preparations began both of us were exhausted. Nevertheless, we made it out to multiple stores to pick up the needed supplies. It wouldn’t have been so bad, but we finally decided to get a folding table to utilize the as yet unutilized middle of the kitchen as well as a 5 quart sauté pan from Calphalon. Yup, that’s right, Calphalon. And yes, that one pan cost about the same as our entire last set of cookware, but it was soooooo worth it.
Lisa did most of the cooking, so I hang my head in shame…!@(images/familydinner0503/suzannelaura.jpg:R popimg: “Suzanne and Laura join in early”) I feel like some pathetic unmanly grunt, but my main function was creating salads. Lisa, on the other hand, made an amazing pasta salad, two soups, and chicken divan (hence the need for the new pan). The chicken was a complete gamble and really paid off. The only thing that didn’t work was the usually !@(images/familydinner0503/mompaige.jpg popimg: “Grandma and baby Paige”)sure-fire Yucatan-style orzo soup (sans chicken). Normally great, we misjudged the amount of orzo for a larger pot and it took over the soup. Oh well, there was still more than enough food for everybody and wonderful time was had by all. My family is very amenable, and helped out by bringing even more food, wine, and plates as well as cleaning said plates.
In other words, you couldn’t pull off a night for them without them…
I really do love my family, so this was really important for me. Only one of my sisters ever !@(images/familydinner0503/lucascaleb.jpg popimg: “Lucas and Caleb call it a night”)got to see my first apartment after college, and I only had some family over a few times in the second place even though I was there for 4 years. Not everybody could make it this time, but we still managed to pack in my parents, 4 sisters, 3 brother-in-laws, 2 nephews, and a niece. !@(images/familydinner0503/dadpaige.jpg:R popimg: “Grandpa and baby Paige”)We’ll try again in a couple months when the weather is nicer so the backyard can be used and more people can come.
Sunday was a bit of a respite as we headed out into the boonies (Blairstown) for dinner with friends and gazing at all of the land you can own when you don’t live next to New York City. They have horses for neighbors! Okay, the horses’ owners are probably the real neighbors, but we just walked over to their fence and fed them carrots! That’s really cool. And enough to completely destroy any possibility that Lisa would want to live in the city again.
A packed weekend, but I wouldn’t change it. Now I can just look forward to our vacation on Thurday. Oh yeah, we’re heading down to Florida for a few days, so who knows how scarce I’ll be.