Henry Turned 6(part dos)

Henry turned 6, here is how it went down…..

  

 

HAPPY DAY H

6 Year old birthday(all boy)

Henry is turning 6 and we are prepping our MInecraft birthday party.  I can't believe how time flys.  

We love you H!!!!

 

Mil Besos

Planning a Special Occasion: a Dinner Party

Last weekend we celebrated my awesome sister in law, Lindsay's birthday with a little dinner party at our house.  She and I both love to have people over for a home cooked meal, and I was thrilled to pull out all the stops to make it a special dinner for her.  

On a normal day--let's just be honest here-- we use our basic plates, eat in front of the TV, and half the time use paper towels for napkins.  But when we have friends over for dinner Jady and I love to pull out a tablecloth, light the candles and use our fancier table settings.  Why only use things like china and crystal once or twice a year?  While I don't reinvent the wheel or do anything particularly creative, I like expressing through a pretty table that we're happy that you're here, and you coming to dinner makes this a special occasion.  

Another element of dinner party prep that I love is choosing and arranging the flowers.  Because I'm always busy grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning up the house before everyone arrives, I like to go with pretty simple, easy arrangements that aren't going to stress me out. 

 I happened to know that Lindsay loves the combination of pale pink and bright green, so while at Trader Joe's I picked up a bunch of stargazer lilies, some pink roses and a few hydrangeas in a fresh chartreuse.  At home I soaked a foam oasis in water for a few minutes before positioning it in a silver bowl and cutting and sticking in each stem.

The flowers looked lovely all night, but on day two I noticed that two of the three hydrangeas had already begun drooping, and before long they had totally given out.  Ugh, what is the deal?  I'm clearly doing something wrong, since I have only a 50/50 record with keeping hydrangeas alive for very long.  I clearly need a tutorial from Mel, the flower whisperer, 'cause this is just sad:

Desserts are usually something that I personally like to delegate or buy for dinner parties, since I prefer to spend my time on other areas, and birthday cakes I definitely leave to the professionals.  While I *can* bake, I like to keep events like this fun for myself (so that I'll be excited to do them again), and that involves learning what I want to tackle and what to outsource.  How fun is this polka dotted birthday cake?  I definitely made the right decision with this one, and I was able to enjoy the night along with everyone else.

Happy partying!

xo

Liza

Christmas Party Tent: Adding an Extra Room to the House

Each year we like to throw a little Christmas cocktail party at our house as early in December as possible, partly to catch everyone before their schedules fill up, and partly to get on the calendar before they're sick of Christmas parties:)  I knew we'd invited more people than in the past, so cramming them into the house could be a bit of a challenge, which is why we decided to buy this tent for the back deck to add another room to accommodate all of those extra bodies.  I was so excited when it arrived, even though it comes in three huge, super heavy boxes full of about a million parts that looked pretty intimidating at first when we opened everything up.  Actually, assembling this monster turned out to be satisfying and even quick, with the two of us working together.  But who am I kidding?  I love this kind of thing:)

Once the tent itself was in place, we got to work making the space a bit less carport-like and a little more party ready.  Jady's enthusiasm for Christmas decorating is boundless and contagious in the happiest way, and I'm always grateful for his tireless efforts when it comes to hanging lights and schlepping trees around.  I picked up some extra long strands of white lights, which we hung all around the sides and top of the tent.  Then, to soften the look of the lovely vinyl and metal construction, I brought home 20 yards of inexpensive white muslin fabric and hung that over the lights on the ceiling.  The fabric turned out to be such simple addition, and I was really pleased with the difference in the feel of the space.

For this year's party I decided to go super simple with the tree and barely hung any ornaments at all-- and while I'd like to claim it as a minimalist design decision, it actually just knew I wouldn't have time to fuss over it and bumped decorating the tree way down on the priority list.  Better to have a bare tree than hungry guests, right?  I think I made the right choice.

The night of our party the weather turned out to be terrible-- as in heavy snow and icy roads that stranded a bunch of our friends on back roads and up steep driveways.  But tons of people risked life and limb to come party with us anyway!  The day before, to help cozy up the deck area and to try to keep the freezing air out a bit, we laid out some carpet remnant and an extra couple of rugs I had stashed away.  The electric heaters were a critical addition, given the weather, and I have a feeling we're going to use them a ton between now and summertime.

Sadly, with all of this effort and party prepping, I am the WORST at remembering to take pictures of the actual event!  Ugh.  This one is literally one of two photos I snapped at the very beginning of the night.  I seriously need a personal assistant:)

xo

Liza