Dinner for Friends

We had a lovely dinner last Saturday night. With everyone's busy lives, it's so very hard to get people together for anything. I've been wanting these two families over for two years now! Since after we moved in. I gave the two families over a month's notice to put the dinner on their schedules, hoping I could get ahead of the Holiday madness, but one family could not come. Lo and behold, a high school friend of David's was in Tampa, so he was invited to come over for dinner as well. Counting us, there were 5 adults, 3 teens and 2 little ones.


I love playing hostess. I got the "formal dining room" (you have to say that with your nose in the air and say "fuh fuh fuh" right after) all gussied up. Formal people don't say gussied?

Here's the formal (fuh fuh fuh) dining room. Isn't it purty? (why is my picture over on the right? I didn't tell it to do that?) The china pattern belonged to my parents when they were married.

My mom handed them down to me. They are so 70's and I love them.

Just wanted to show you the piano. This is the formal (I won't do it) living room. The piano and pictures were given to us from David's grandmother's home after she passed. Jake plays the piano often. He's playing it now as I type. The picture above the piano is awesome. It was a Christmas gift to David's grandmother from when she worked in the White House...from President and Mrs. Nixon in 1969. It has a Christmas message from them. It's a little American and family history and the entire room's color scheme is based off that single picture.

Back to the dinner. The guests arrived early (we were betting late; we lost) and I wasn't even done cooking! Nor was I out of my sweats. Wow, bad hostess! Dinner was delish (chicken breasts cut into tenders, breaded in bread crumbs, grated asiago cheese, rosemary, thyme and garlic, fried in olive oil and then baked, angel hair pasta and tomato sauce, a green bean casserole, garlic bread out of the oven and salad. For dessert, my guests brought a lemon cake and some flan, and I had made my Killer Brownies.) We were stuffed and had a fun time hanging out with friends. It's just too bad we can't do it more often.