loracs | I'm Alive

I'd planned to write something about the the xmas party the day after (that would be last Sunday, Dec. 11), but I was so tired I just couldn't make myself do it. I cleaned up a little and slept on and off all day.

It was a really fun party, even if I do say so myself, which I am. The house was decorated to the hilt. I even managed to put the last little ornament in place - Hedwig preparing to land on Harry Potter's outstretch arm, just a few hours before it started.

The Food. There was lots and lots of it. Meat and cheese deli platter, homemade beef chili, pesto pasta salad, jello/sour cream mold (thanks

clever_doberman), spicy peanut-butter/yogurt dip (thanks

dbubley), non-dairy onion dip, goat cheese with chives, blue cheese stuffed olives, green olives, pitted kalamata olives, roasted red peppers, sun-dried tomatoes in oil, eggplant/pepper dip, pickled artichokes, raw veggies (carrots, broccoli, mushrooms) with ranch dip, buffalo wings with blue cheese dip, artichoke fritata, zucchini fritata, salsa, chips, breads and crackers. I've probably missed a few things but that's most of the food. My friends, S & G. showed up with rumaki (bacon wrapped pineapple, water chestnut or scallop)- that was quite a hit too!

Then there were the desserts. The chocolate fountain was great - it looked just like I imagined. Once the chocolate was melted, I turned on the auger and up, up, up the warm chocolate rose to the top of the tube and then cascaded over the 3 shelves. And it was very good dark chocolate. For our dipping pleasure we had: marshmallows, ladyfinger cookies, bananas, caramels and mini-creme puffs. For those that just COULD NOT get enough chocolate, there were rich dark chocolate truffles. Alone they are amazing - dipping them just pushed it over my personal limit, but several folks made that jump.

And finally, I made my Aunt Emma's Rum Balls. For those folks that like alcohol, they hit the spot. It's really just your basic rum ball recipe but in my family Aunt Emma made them every year. She was, well . . . there's really no other word for her . . . she was cheap. Why put 1/2 cup of mayo in the big bowl of potato salad when 2 tablespoons would do - you just had to mix it longer! But when it came to her rum balls, there was no sparing of the rum. We use to kid her each year that anyone eating more than 3 of her rum balls had to turn over their car keys! This is the most direct of my family traditions that I still do every year. Besides "the have plenty of food" tradition - if you're expecting an army make enough for 2 armies, because you never know, they might bring friends.

Well, that's the food part. The party part was just as much fun. There was a nice flow of people, about 35 showed up, but I don't think we ever had more than 20 people in the house at one time, which is about right for the size of our house.

I love showing off my weird collection of xmas stuff. I have lots of singing & moving snowmen, santa's, xmas trees and other creatures (the duck with the santa hat that dances to the chicken dance music comes to mind) and most of them get their moment in the xmas lights as people play with them. I usually show off the new ones and believe me, there ARE new ones every year! This year's new ones included: the flirty xmas tree complete with red high-heel shoes that moves and sings "Santa Baby", the hip hop snowman that sings a song that has nothing to do with xmas but he IS a snowman and he does have a blinking diamond (or is it a ice cube) in his front tooth, the singing & hat tipping Grinch and the butt shaking santa that asks the question "Are you ready for this?" just before he turns around to show you his rhythmic butt. I'm going to try and shoot a little photo tour of the decorations before I take them down. I'll put them on Flickr. For now, here's a link to just a few pictures from the party. Thanks

clever_doberman for taking some of the photos.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/61898632@N00/sets/1592123/

Finally, I want to thank

serenejournal for all her help both the night before and during the party. She was the supreme co-hostess, making sure all the bowls were refilled as needed. This is her third year helping me out and I don't know how I did it without her.

serenejournal, thank you, Thank You, THANK YOU!