Party Day Memories

Last year I made the comment that I would tell the story of the one year someone brought something not up to party standards. I did not because Kat suggested that someone would take it as a challenge and we would have to deal with that again. I know that people suspect that it is all me with the silver platters and the pretty cookies and the plan of what food goes where. Ok, so it is me mostly, but Kat started it.

So yes, one year a friend brought tuna fish sandwiches on a paper plate. “Wow!” was the only thing I could think to say, and Kat followed up with “You shouldn’t have”. And really, it would have been better if they hadn’t. But worse than the paper plate on Kat’s table of delicious goodies, was that people ate them. Toddler year old Paul helped himself to one, but spit it out.

Other food mishaps are the years that we discover after the party is over that we neglected to put out food we had prepared. The first year Kat made tapenade it never made it to the table. The same is true of the feta red pepper artichoke dip. Last year we made a sharp cheddar chasse ball that was to be served with the green chile pineapple jelly, but Kat put the jelly on cream cheese instead. The cheese ball did NOT melt into queso very well at new years.

Do you like apple cider? Do you really? I ask because in 2001 no one drank it. But that may be because someone neglected to put a ladle in the crock pot of cider to serve it with. Likewise, no one will eat summer sausage if there is not a knife to slice it with. 1998.

Sometimes people ask how long it takes to clean up afterwards. That question has different answers. In recent years our family; Ann, Christi, Nolen & Elisa plus others have made a real effort to help us clean as we go, so that by the time the party is over and the food is away, much of the cleaning is done. Of course some years it is Valentine’s Day before the clean party dishes are returned to where they spend most the year. And this year, in July, when we were rearranging furniture in the office I found a punch cup. In my defense, it was on the floor between the two trunks I had made a makeshift table from for the Christmas train. I choose to believe that a child left it there, and not an adult who thought it would be interesting to see how long before we found it.