Goal #5 AND #9

So this past Saturday night was my and one of my best friends birthday parties. Our birthdays are a week apart and have had the exact same group of friends since I can remember, so we usually do a joint get together.

Unfortunately due to the timing (ACDC in Toronto, a sports conference in Toronto), several of our close friends couldn't make it, so it was a smaller get together with somewhat of a random group of prople. As such, I didn't really feel it necessary to get particularly creative, per se with the party as I goaled (eh?) myself to do this month. A little bit though, and I think it was perfect for our group.

Lots of food. I mean, LOTS of food. Since I know our friends and I know that, despite several requests, I may know get an rsvp, so I wanted to make sure that there was enough food for unexpected drop ins. Plus a few people brought food that I wasn't expecting, which was very nice. So there are a lot of leftovers, and hubs will be bringing hamburgers, sausages and pasta salad for lunch every day this week. And probably most dinners too.

The menu was:

Nacho dip

Veggies & Dip

Chips & other munchies

Plus, some friends brought spinach dip & pumpernickle as well as a veggie puff pastry pizza appy

Hamburgers (we ran out of ground beef, so had to buy meat for the first time in 7 months)

Homemade chicken burgers (using our bulk meat)

sausages

caesar salad

potato salad

pasta salad

Birthday cake

Birthday cupcakes

Fruit skewers/kabobs

Plus, a friend brought a bin full of sliced watermelon as well

Sounds delish, huh?

I was relieved for a change, that my job has some *ahem* dry spells, so I could plan everything prior to the weekend and avoid scrambling around trying to get everything done and being stressed & panicked when it wasn't. And, I'm an accountant, and naturally anal-retentive by nature, so of course I had a spreadsheet to organize everything, including the timeline (inspired by the now defunct Hyper Homemaker). Most of the prep was done Friday night, so I even had time for a pedi on Saturday afternoon-excellent.

So, basically the point of this all is to toot my own horn at the cake and cupcakes I made for us. The cake was for my amiga and the cupcakes were for me (it just didn't feel right baking my own birthday cake). Both took significantly longer than I'd alloted to decorate, but I think in the end, it worked out:

So I'm pretty certain I can check off both goals this month with confidence. I'm definitely enjoying the classes, and I did put a lot of effort into Saturday's celebration. Plus---if you consider the coincidences of matching plastic table ware thanks to Dollarama, as well as my co-birthday girl and I both wearing white bottoms and purple shirt, which happen to (unintentially, I swear) coordinate with the cupcakes & cake...it's pretty flippin' creative :)