We (almost) brought in 2009 with our neighbors. Leigh Anne came up with the idea of a progressive dinner. Right now there are only four families living here...another family who's house is "close" to completion joined us too. The newest neighbors are younger (without kids) and had actual plans to leave LakeSide for the evening. I was placed in charge of desserts.
We arrived back home from Illinois Monday afternoon. The weather was great so I played outside with Ben and the new Gator. Eventually all the neighbors were out in the cul-de-sac like the good 'ole days of summer. (Jeremy refers to this as "Wisteria Lane". And yes he watches Desperate Housewives often enough to remember the street name.) By the time I threw in a few loads of laundry and started unpacking, it was practically time for bed.
Tuesday somehow got away from me. I was trying to clean the house for the upcoming event, but didn't get too far before it was time to go to work. I still had no idea as to what desserts I would be making and was secretly hoping that they would just miraculously appear.
My cooking/baking skills are somewhat limited...(OK a LOT limited), so I was getting a little nervous... I was up at 5 am on Wednesday searching for recipes on allrecipes.com for ideas. I found two that I thought were doable so I printed them out along with the handy dandy shopping list and headed back to bed for another hour of sleep. After the appointment with my rheumatologist, I made a quick trip to pick up the ingredients for strawberry pretzel salad and chocolate turtle brownie pie, neither of which I had made before. (I also bought a cheesecake sampler-just in case!)
The afternoon was a flurry of flour, chocolate and Pledge. By the time we were ready to go, I was sure that I was 0 for 3. I didn't let the pretzel crust cool long enough and the jell-0 had started to set before I spread it on top, I added 2/3 of baking chocolate to the brownies instead of 1/3, and the chocolate chip cookies(that I whipped up for the kids) were hard and crumbly. That cheesecake might just come in handy.
At 6:00 we walked over to Shawn and Leigh Anne's house for appetizers. Ben was upstairs fast as lightening to play with the kids. Owen was pretty tired already since he decided not to take his afternoon nap. He was calm and content as we all snacked on the impressive spread.
We made our way back home for dessert around nine. I was glad that everyone had enjoyed a few drinks and might not notice the streaks on the mirror that I forgot to wipe or that the food was not edible. Olivia, who is 10, skeptically asked me if I was a good baker. Hmmm, we'd have to wait and see. I made Jeremy the guinea pig taste tester before serving and received a thumbs up. After having seconds of each, Olivia made my night by letting me know that I was a good baker after all. (Remember she is only 10!)
The kids range in ages from 12 to 1...but they all seemed to have great time. The older crew played Wii while the youngest ran around and tormented them. Owen was able to sleep through all the fun going on throughout the house.We celebrated the new year with the East Coast before the first melt down of the evening. Ben was quick to follow suit, so we called it an "early" (even though it was waaay past our normal bedtime) evening.
Happy New Year!
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