Partied like it was 2009! Part I

This weekend, we used the excuse of our new house, our new baby, and a long weekend to celebrate with all our friends. In classic Chris and Bonnie style, we threw a Low Country Boil with absolutely no experience (except our annual trek to The Crab Shack for a massive helping of the delicious shrimp-y, sausage-y concoction), and very little preparation. And with classic Chris and Bonnie style, it came off like we knew exactly what we were doing, and we had an amazing time!


This was a true test for our house, which we'd spent years designing and building. We LOVE to have our friends and family gather in our home - hosting dinners, soirees, parties and pickin's are our cup of tea! My home feels alive, and happily full, when I have friends over, and Chris and I wanted a place that allowed us to bring as many in as we wanted, for any number of events. We wanted a place that Hayden can grow up and feel comfortable bringing her friends over to play and explore and eat and enjoy. This wonderful, wonderful house passed the test with flying colors. To me, a home is not the brick and wood that it is built with, but it's the family and love it can contain, protect and nurture. I was thrilled that the weather was perfect for opening the doors along the back of the house, and everyone was able to flow in and out amongst the rooms, around the porch and through the spaces easily, and without it ever feeling crowded, and without it being too loud from the merry making that was going on in our living room.


Speaking of merry making, and the baby grand piano that was being used to make merry... I like to pick on Chris about how he handles my lists, which I'm sure are an endless source of amusement for him in and of themselves. I'm a list maker. That's what I do. Going to the store? I make a list. Going to bed? I make a mental list of everything to do the next morning. Throwing a party? I make lists of the lists that I need - guests to invite, food to buy, things to clean, to purchase, to throw away... I love a list! Chris takes my lists in stride for the most part, and does a good job in helping me knock off the items on them. Most of the time. I also think Chris secretly adds his own items to the ends of my lists and decides to focus his energies there first.
That, my friends, is how we came to have a baby grand piano sitting in our living room the day before our party. Granted, the house was designed in part around having a piano there, and it was always part of the plan to move one in... I just didn't figure out until Thursday or so that Chris's plan was to move it in now. Before you go getting all impressed that we have a baby grand piano, you should know that it was given to us by our real estate agent, on the condition we get it out of another house she was trying to sell (it had been given to her by the owner, on the condition she get it out of the house). It's not much of a piano, and in terrible need of a restoration that Chris says we won't invest in for this particular model, but as I've mentioned before he has grander plans (no pun intended) for a piano.

However, no party would be complete (apparently) without a piano, so in the days, and hours, before the get-together, as I was scrubbing, sweeping, wiping, washing and cooking, Chris was cleaning up, dusting off, moving and tuning our PIANO. As you can imagine, he was high on my list of favorite people at the time. Thankfully for him, and our marriage, our friends Carrie and Joel came to save the day, and as Chris and Joel tuned each key, Carrie helped me vaccuum, move furniture and clean. All in all it made for a fun pre-party party, and we got it all done in time, so we were both happy with the results.