Prompt: Party. What social gathering rocked your socks off in 2010? Describe the people, music, food, drink, clothes, shenanigans.
(Author: Shauna Reid)
There is no greater satisfaction than hosting a party that comes together perfectly, is relaxed and comfortable and mixes together a lot of diverse people who all get along. That describes my daughter's high school graduation party this past June. A graduation party? This is the party that "rocked your socks off?" Well actually, yes it did.
The basic idea of this party had the potential to be a very painful experience. Yet something made us forge ahead because, if we could by chance pull it off, it would be awesome. We all wanted to be with my daughter for her celebration --- my husband, my mother, our relatives...her father, his wife, their kids, their relatives...our neighbors....our friends...her friends...see what I mean? Could we honestly pull off a party where EVERYONE came? Sure, why not? Let's push it a bit more, how about if we (my husband and I AND my ex-husband and his wifeI) co-hosted? Sure, friends thought we were crazy. Honestly, I thought we were crazy. But we did it anyway and it was pretty terrific.
We were blessed with a beautiful sunny day. The party was in the yard. The food was in the dining room and a continuously running slide show of 18 years of my daughter's life was in the living room. There was also a table set up with muslin squares and pigma pens for guests to write messages to be incorporated into a quilt. (Note: yes, this would be the dreaded graduation quilt mentioned a few posts ago.) Throughout the day, people dropped in and visited. They talked and ate and sat down to watch the slide show. Most signed quilt blocks and said their good-byes. Others came early and stayed late. Still other came late and stayed even later. By the end of the night, as we cleaned up, there were still a group of my daughter's friends outside laughing and telling stories in the dark.
The food was great. The menu was chosen by my daughter. I made several pans of macaroni and cheese, buffalo chicken bites and hamburger barbecue and her stepmother (who is from Mexico) made an amazing taco bar with various fillings, homemade salsa and toppings. There was great chocolate cake with peanut butter frosting.
Miss Scarlett, the sometimes crazy beagle, was on her best behavior visting with people and getting too many treats. Even the cats made quiet appearances from time to time, didn't jump up on non-cat people and disappeared when things got a bit loud.
So why did this party rock my socks off? Because we dared to dream that we could pull off a party that included a widely diverse groups of people who shared one common thing -- they love my daughter. And we were right! Dream Big!
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