February Made Me Shiver

I was AWOL throughout the month of February.  So I thought I'd do a quick re-cap of the Pearl family goings-on during that extended hiatus from the blog.

In early February, our granddaughter Princesa (oldest daughter of son #3) turned six.  And her Papa and I decided that as a special birthday treat, we would take her out to dinner and then shopping at Target afterward.  We went to a fun brew pub-type restaurant, arriving early enough to beat the dinner crowd, and we had the most wonderful time.  

This restaurant had mac and cheese on the kids' menu; and better yet, they included an image
of the Kraft box right there on the menu to ensure your kids would love it.  (Ours did.)

That little girl was absolutely adorable throughout our "date night" together.  Her mom had warned us that she would be thrilled, but would probably be a bit shy on her own and not say a whole lot.  Nothing could have been further from the truth!  She was so animated and chatty all night.  It made us realize that this is something we need to start doing with all of our grandchildren when they get old enough to behave for it/appreciate it.  With 18 of them now, and another on the way any day, it's getting harder and harder to get good quality one-on-one time with each precious child.  When the whole gang is at our house for a family party, it's utter chaos (in the best way of course; but still...chaos).

Our second-born son also had an early February birthday, and we were able to celebrate it by having dinner with him at his house, with his wife and four young sons.  (I brought the cake!)

I LOVE the way Junior, his oldest son, is looking at my boy here!

I told you not too long ago that our oldest son and his family were moving away to Iowa, after living a stone's throw from us in VA for more than four years.  About a week-and-a-half into February, we drove out there to see their new digs and offer whatever help we could after the birth of their new baby girl, who'd been born two weeks ahead of schedule in late January.  This sweet little peanut has four older sisters, aged 10, 10, 8, and 6, and a 3-and-a-half-year-old brother.

My boy and his girl.  Is this not the sweetest?!

It was so wonderful to see all of them, of course, but also to see their new house and their new town, so that when I think of them I can picture them in their new surroundings. When we got there, the baby was still struggling to gain weight, but by the time we left two weeks later, she was doing great.  Her little cheeks had gotten visibly rounder during our stay.  And what a little angel she is!

One thing I did find out during those two weeks in February: five years of living in VA has made me SOFT!  Not that I ever liked being cold; but I did, after all, grow up in Upstate NY and raise my boys in NH, so I had to be tough.  I've survived many a brutal Nor'easter.   I am no stranger to snow and ice and below-freezing temperatures.  But yikes!  It was cold out there in Iowa!  Windy and cold.  BRRRR!

There was one mild day, however, and we took advantage of it by going for a walk with the five older kids along the country road on which they live.

Those fields will soon be full of corn!

It was sweet to see how much the older girls doted on their baby sister.  She has a lot of loving mothers dying to hold her, that's for sure.

Beautiful!

We returned from Iowa on Saturday, Feb. 26.  And remember that chaos I alluded to earlier in this post?  Well, on Sunday, Feb. 27 we hosted a little Mardi Gras party for our VA gang: sons #2, #3, and #4, their wives, and their 12 kids aged 7 and under.  (We would have waited until the official "Fat Tuesday" on March 1, the night before the start of Lent; but it's hard to get everyone together on school/work nights.)  I bought all the paper goods and party favors well ahead of time, and I made a lasagna and a King Cake before we left for Iowa and put them in the freezer.  Each family contributed side dishes to the meal, so I had minimal work to do for the party when we got back home. We didn't have much time to rest up from our travels before the festivities, but I was anxious to see everyone as soon as possible after being away for so long.  

Even though my husband and I had never hosted a Mardi Gras party the whole time we were raising our family, we have now had three of them down here in VA.  So it appears that it's becoming a bit of a tradition for us with the grandchildren!

I guess that about wraps it up.  We've been busy since we got back from Iowa.  We go to daily Mass.  We've been having our twice-weekly playdates with son #4's wife and four kids (Braveheart makes the 35-minute drive on Tuesdays and Thursdays so the triplets can attend a Catholic pre-school in our town).

We've done a bit of babysitting here and there, and a bit of visiting.  One night last week, son #2 (who lives about 50 minutes north of us) and sons #3 and #4 (who live about 35 minutes south) met up to see the new Batman movie at the little theater in our town.  And afterward, they came by our house to say hi and grab coffees-to-go.  I cannot tell you what a joy it is for their dad and me just to have them around, to hear them talking and laughing.  We don't even care if we're part of their conversation; just having them hanging out together under our roof and listening to the sound of their voices makes us so happy.  (No matter how old they get, they will always be my boys!  Always.)

I miss our two boys from whom we are separated, geographically--so much that it often brings me to tears.  However, I know just how lucky a mom and grandmother I am.  It's such a blessing to have so many of our family members living nearby.  Our kids are our best friends, truly; but there's been a surprising  development in recent months: we've gotten to be good friends with a couple we met at church--a couple who moved here about a year ago and whose reasons for relocating are very much like ours.  It took almost five years of adjusting to our "new" life in VA, but we are beginning to make connections, and we have our wonderful little parish to thank for that!  But more on that later.

Until next time...

Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Flattery

Right?  Or so I've heard.

I have been wearing a headband to keep my long, straight (fine, limp, scraggly, etc.) hair off my face every day for DECADES now. It’s my signature hair do (or don’t?).

The night my second son was born in 1985, I went from 7 to 10 cm in an instant, much to everyone’s surprise, and had to be hastily rolled down a LONG and crowded hospital hallway on a gurney, from labor to delivery, trying to keep a baby in (“Don’t push yet!  Breathe!” instructed the nurses), and this baby most definitely wanted OUT.  I was frantically doing that "hoo hoo" breathing technique they teach you in Lamaze classes, for when you have the urge to push but aren’t supposed to, but it didn't seem like there was any way I was going to be able to keep that baby from making his appearance in the hallway.  So in the most dramatic moment of any of my five experiences with childbirth, I ripped the headband off my head and flung it, crying, “That’s it, I quit!  I’m not doing this!”  My oh-so-funny husband looked at one of the nurses and calmly asked, “Um, is that an option?”

When we got to the delivery room, my son came bursting into the world after two quick pushes.  (And I never got that headband back.)

So as I said, and as that story illustrates, headbands have been a part of my daily “look” forever.  For goodness sake, I even wore them during childbirth.

Apparently, it has not escaped my grandchildren's notice that headbands and Grammy go together.  A few months ago, my daughter-in-law Preciosa (wife of son #3) texted me a picture of her 2-year-old Hermanita, who had put a headband on her cute little still-practically-hairless noggin and announced, “I Grammy!” 

How hilarious is that?  She’s on to me!

“I GRAMMY!”

If only I could look as good wearing a headband as that adorable little gal!

Telling my newest grandchild, #18,
"Get used to this headband, my wee one.  You're going to see a lot of it."

Other than the gold Miraculous Medal necklace that I wear always, a headband is my only must-have wardrobe accessory.  What about you?  What item will your grandkids see that will automatically make them think of you?  Please share!

Inspired to Paint

I have been dabbling in the fine arts of drawing and painting for as long as I can remember.  I am mostly self-taught, aside from two art classes that I took in college (but honestly didn't much enjoy, because the professor was a huge fan of modern art—which is not really my cup of tea.  At all!).  So my work is not professional quality by any stretch of the imagination.  But I have a compulsion to draw and paint and these hobbies have given me an inestimable amount of joy throughout my life. 

In 2020, I was suddenly inspired—by a prayer, actually—to try to paint the face of Jesus.  I blogged about that painting awhile back, and included the prayer that inspired it, in a post called “Tears Become Pearls.”  

I was happy every minute that I worked on that painting, feeling very close to Jesus the whole time, and the hours flew. The first "finished" painting looked like this.

It was so finished that it was even hanging in our house...But after a while, the facial hair started to look wrong to me. I began to wonder why I hadn't connected the mustache to the beard.  I also wished I'd made Jesus' halo larger and lower down, closer to his shoulders (my husband admitted that he thought it might look better that way).

The facial hair was an easy fix.  But I didn't want to mess too much with the halo, since it had been a long time since I'd worked on the painting, and I was afraid I’d have to totally redo the background if I couldn’t match the original colors; so I opted to keep it where it was and just enlarge the circle. 

Better?  (You don’t need to answer that!)

Recently, I started to think about painting a companion for this portrait of Jesus.  His beautiful Mother, Mary, seemed like the perfect choice.

I wasn't sure how I wanted my Mary to look; but I didn't want to peruse all the famous images of Her, because I was afraid I'd just try to imitate them.  Then while scrolling through my phone’s camera roll, I came across this photo of me holding my granddaughter Hermanita, when she was in the PICU battling RSV back in December of 2019.  (The mask and gloves were RSV visitor protocol, not Covid-related!!) On a whim, I decided to use that photo to do the general sketch of Madonna and Child, and then I just went from there.

Day one, this is how it was looking.

And about a week later, this was the finished portrait.

Of course, I thought that painting of Jesus was finished, and then more than a year later I tweaked it.  This painting may get a little belated TLC, too, I guess.  But I have found over the years that if I try too hard to make something "perfect," I sometimes overwork it and ruin it altogether.  So for now, I'm going to leave well enough alone.

When I wrote Finding Grace and Erin's Ring, I was inspired to tell stories that would positively reflect our beautiful Catholic Faith, fight the dangerous messages the world was sending to vulnerable young readers, and bring glory to God.  I think any time we use our talents and gifts in this life, in every single endeavor we undertake, that should be the ultimate goal: giving glory to God, from Whom all blessings flow.  Forget money; forget worldly successes and accolades: they mean nothing.  I should have been using whatever artistic talents God gave me to do the same when it came to painting.  I don't know why it took me until I was in my 60's to finally become inspired to paint holy images, but better late than never, I suppose.

I am often brought to tears because of the state of our world, and I'm sure I don't have to elaborate about what I mean by that.  You know just what I'm talking about, if you've been alive the past two years.  And it seems as if things just keep getting worse.  I can become consumed by fear for what the future will bring for my kids and grandkids.  But creating these images of these beloved faces helped me to remember Who is really in charge and therefore, how pointless worrying is.  He's got this.  We just have to have faith that He knows what's best for our souls.  We need to pray unceasingly and take comfort in the fact that God loves us even more than we love our own children.  Hard to imagine, but true.

I will not find paradise in this life, even though I have been inordinately blessed.  But being surrounded by comforting holy images helps me to imagine what it will be like if I get there.  And creating them is a balm for my soul.

(I haven't blogged in more than a month!  Yikes, time flies these days--and so much has happened while I've been away.  I plan to do a catch-up post sometime this week.  Also, thank you to the wonderful readers who've left comments on my last few posts.  I have not gotten around to replying to all of them, and I hope to do a bit of catching up there, too!)

A Birthday Celebration, and Celebrating a Birth

Last Sunday, we had a family get-together to celebrate the late January/early February birthdays in the Pearl family.  Son #5 turned 29 in January, and then exactly a week later, son #4 turned 34.  Our granddaughter Princesa (the second oldest of son #3's four kids) is about to turn 6 in February, followed a few days later by her uncle (our son #2), who will be turning 37.

Gulp!  It's hitting me that when our "baby" celebrates his next birthday, he will be turning 30.  Which means that in January of 2023, all five of our boys will be in their 30's...for a little while anyway, until our firstborn turns 40 later in the year.  40!!

It's fine.  I'm fine.  No biggie, really.  Except...WHERE IN THE WORLD DID THE YEARS GO?  I MEAN REALLY, Y'ALL, WHERE?  (Did you notice that "y'all" I threw in there?  I thought that after almost five years of being a Virginian, I should start talking like one.)

Anyhoo--

With our oldest son and his family now settled in their new house out in Iowa, this recent family party was a tad smaller that the ones we've been hosting since we moved here in 2017.  We had 20 gathered together in all, eight adults and 12 children (between the ages of one and seven).  Our youngest son, although one of the birthday boys, couldn't be here either, because he and his wife live in Nashville; but we FaceTimed with him during the festivities. And in honor of him, I made a pin-the-tail game for the kids to play that featured one of his and his wife's beloved (or at least tolerated?) kitty-cats.

Instead of spending hours slaving over a hot stove, my husband and I opted to order and pick up Chipotle catering for 20, and I can't recommend this enough. Everyone loves it, there are always leftovers, and they even give you the disposable dishes, serving utensils, plasticware, and napkins.  It's not cheap, but it's well worth it for a special occasion.  All I had to make was a Bailey's Irish cream cake (a crowd-pleasing recipe from Emily Stimspson Chapman's cookbook) and two dozen cupcakes.  Easy peasy.

I am always happiest when all of our peeps--or as many as possible--are with us, under Papa and Grammy's humble roof, making memories together.  Even though my husband and I have a favorite post-party joke that instead of putting the house back together again after everyone has gone home, perhaps we should just torch the place and start over (ha ha!), we truly wouldn't have it any other way.  It gets very messy, but it's always SO worth it.  And I don't know what we'd do without that spacious basement that we finished off with our own two hands. (Actually, my favorite guy's two hands did a lot more of the work than mine did, but I helped where I could.)

These two birthday boys were New England fans growing up;
and they're Tampa Bay fans now, too.
All of our boys are big fans of the GOAT, Tom Brady.

Three days after our little birthday shindig, we got the happy news that our firstborn son's wife had given birth to their new baby girl, who is their 6th child this side of Heaven.  She wasn't due until February 10, but arrived about two weeks early.  She was born at home with the help of a midwife, and mom and baby are doing well!  

So we have 18 grandchildren now, and yet another January birthday to add to the family calendar.  God is so good!

I love my gang so much.  I feel like the luckiest woman on earth.  I like to quote Jim Harbaugh, whose family motto growing up was, "Who's got it better than we do?  Nobody!"  

A Poignant Lesson about Dealing with Loss

Those of you who've been following along here for a long time (hi, my handful of faithful readers!), or those who might have only stumbled upon this humble little blog in the last few years or so, know that my husband and I made a big move south in March of 2017.  (It's a recurring topic here at String o' Pearls; but old folks like me tend to repeat their stories, as you might have heard.)  We left our longtime home in NH, where we'd lived in the same house for 26 years, and moved to a small town in Northern VA.  Three of our five sons had moved to the same area (two of them are practically next door neighbors, and the third lives less than two hours north of them), and they appeared to be putting down permanent roots; so after much soul searching (and much encouragement from the most loving peanut gallery imaginable), we decided to relocate.  We realized that if no one was going to be moving back to the Northeast, our home in NH didn't make much sense anymore...and we found a perfect little town as close to midway as possible between the two places where our VA boys lived and bought a house there.  At the time, we had ten grandchildren with a couple more on the way, and six of them were in VA.  With 3/5 of our sons and more than half of our grandchildren in the same vicinity, it appeared to be as perfect a situation as we could hope to expect.

Our oldest son and his wife and four little girls were living in the Midwest, near her parents.  We figured they would end up settling down out there.  Our youngest son was still single and in the Army, stationed in Germany, and we didn't know where he would end up when all was said and done.  But still, three out of five ain't bad, right?  The decision to move seemed like a no-brainer.

We had a few months in VA getting our new nest feathered, and then we went up to NY, where we spent the summer escaping the VA heat, enjoying Lake Champlain, and managing our Oyster Haven VRBO rental property.  And what do you know: during that time, our firstborn decided to make a radical career change that would have him working out of DC before too long...and living a stone's throw from us.  So when we returned from NY in early September, his wife and four daughters moved in with us while he finished his training.  Within a few months, they'd found a sweet old farmhouse to rent, and it was less than 20 minutes from our house!

A quick aside here: our fourth son's triplets were born right about the time our oldest son's family came to VA. Things got really busy really fast, I'll tell you!

I believe that there was some divine intervention at play with our move, I really do.  We sold our NH house for the full asking price without ever having to put it on the market and found the perfect cozy house in our new VA town, where we could become a central meeting place for our ever-growing family. We didn't initially win the bidding war for this house, but then got it because the other buyer's deal fell through.  Everything just fell into place.  I believe that God arranged things so that we could have not just three but all four of our sons who were married at the time and all of our grandchildren living so close to us that we could be a part of their daily lives.  It's been almost too good to be true.

In the almost five years that we've lived in VA, seven more grandchildren have been added to our string of Pearls, and two more will make an appearance in the coming months.  Our youngest son has gotten out of the Army and is married now.  It's just been an amazing time for our family.

Cue the deep sigh here...because life throws you curve balls, and change is inevitable. Our oldest son has switched companies and is going to be based in Iowa now, so just after the New Year he and his wife had to pack up and move back out to the Midwest.  They bought a charming farmhouse with more than four acres of land--and they are our aspiring homesteaders, so they plan to get chickens and sheep (which they had here in VA) and maybe even a cow! For our son, as far as job satisfaction and quality of life (time at home with his family!), this is just the best move ever. But when he and Regina and their five kids took off in their packed-to-the-gills minivan last Saturday, we felt a bit bereft. That, my friends, was a tough goodbye.

This feels like an enormous loss for my husband and me.  I get weepy-eyed often, trying to adjust to the reality that they won't be a stone's throw from us anymore, that when we say goodbye to them now and they ask "When will we see you again?" it might not be for months.  (Every single time they left our house when they lived near us here, they would ask that.  And it was never more than a few days until we saw them again--a week at most.)  We are going to miss them all so much...but I guess I should dry my tears, since we are planning to drive out to Iowa pretty soon, to help out in the week or two leading up to the birth of baby #6, who's due in early February.

ANYWAY--

I've been way too long-winded with my lead-up here.  I wanted to share something amazing that happened today, but I wanted to make sure you knew just how timely this occurrence was, given my current emotional state.

Our oldest son's four girls (aged 6-10) are doll fanatics. They have American Girl dolls, baby dolls, and porcelain dolls, and they are all played with regularly. Recently I was making a drop-off at Goodwill and I decided to pop in and see what they had.  There was a shelf piled high with porcelain dolls, so I combed through them and found three really pretty ones that were in great shape, priced between $5 and $8, and I decided that I would get them; as long as I could find a fourth, I thought I would bring them out with me when we go to Iowa, as housewarming presents for my favorite doll enthusiasts.

I went to another thrift store (one that I used to frequent with Regina...sniff!), and my search paid off.  I found a never-played-with Little Dutch Girl doll, still in the box with a Royalton Collection brand tag, with her arms and legs still protected by bubble wrap.  Her white garments had some brown mildew or age stains on them, but I spot-cleaned them and she looked terrific.

Today I was about to throw away the box that the Little Dutch Girl doll had come in, but as I turned it over, I saw that there was an exceedingly poignant hand-written message on it.

In case you have trouble reading it, here's what it says:

9/20/98

This is Autum's [sic] Birth Day Doll from Nana--

I will love you baby until my eyes close in death, 

and will always be reminded of the little girl I was

robbed of--

God love you, watch over and keep you 

is my heart's cry to God--

My love

Nana

Oh. my. goodness!  This is so sad...but if there was ever a time that I needed to see what real loss would be like, this is it.  

Did Nana buy this doll for her granddaughter's birthday, even though the little one had already died? Is that why it was like new in the box?  My heart aches for the poor woman who wrote this note!

I will miss my babies terribly.  But I will be able to see them--maybe not as often as I'd like, but I will... unlike this poor grieving grandmother!  If this Nana is still alive, I pray that God has given her solace and peace! And if she's not, I hope she's been reunited with her beloved little darling in Heaven.

Even though five (soon to be six) of our grandchildren will be living a two-day drive away from us, Papa and Grammy still have a very full, very grandchild-rich life in VA.  Just this past week, we had dinner at son #2's house one night, with his four little guys (I forgot to take any pictures). 

Another night, we watched son #3's sweet five-year-old daughter overcome her initial shyness to cheer with her squad on the sidelines at her Christian school's varsity girls' basketball game.

One morning, we babysat for the cheerleader’s two younger sisters while her mom had a 28-week sonogram to check on her baby brother.

We had son #4's four little ones over for two daytime playdates.

"Santa!"

All that in just one week.  How extraordinarily fortunate am I?

I know that I can't even begin to imagine what true suffering, the kind described in that heart-breaking note on the box, is like.  Nevertheless, I reserve the right to feel sad about what we've lost.  Lucky for me, though, there are still plenty of adorable little folks nearby who can help Grammy to remember how very blessed she is!

41 Years and Going Strong!

Forty-one years ago today, my husband and I were married on a bitter cold day in our hometown in Upstate NY, at his family's parish church (which was the one connected to the Catholic high school where we met as freshmen in 1972). We had begun dating at 15, in the summer of 1973, and were married seven years later.  We got engaged in December of 1979 while seniors in college, and chose to get married two days after Christmas the following year.  My husband was going to be starting flight school in the Navy shortly after graduation, and that was pretty much the only time he knew he would be able to get enough days off in a row to get married.

Some people told me that it was a bit selfish to put our families through a wedding during the busy holiday season, but it was either that or wait another whole year or more until he earned his wings.  At that point, we felt like we'd waited long enough to finally start our life together!  And I have to say, a Christmas wedding is so incredibly lovely.  The church is so beautifully decorated already that you don't have to spend a penny on flowers.  Our church was blooming with a profusion of poinsettias and bedecked with garlands of greenery. Wreaths were hung on every pillar, and right  behind us when we had our photos taken on the altar there was a glorious Nativity set.  I can't imagine a more perfect setting, personally, for getting married. 

Or a more perfect partner with whom to go through life. He is my rock.  He is my hero.  And I know that God chose him just for me.

Recently, I found a collage in my Google photos.  It had been made up with pictures of my guy and me without any input on my part.  The top middle photo is from one of my sisters-in-law's weddings in 1993; the rest are more recent, from the past five years or so.  There are a couple taken by our beloved lake in NY, a couple taken on trips to Rome, one in the stands at a Notre Dame football game, and a few from holiday celebrations. This collage managed to include some true highlights of our life together.   (I'm surprised, however, that Google only chose one with us holding a baby grandchild!)  I might have chosen other pictures if I'd made this collage myself, but I thought it was nice and would make a good anniversary tribute.

The Baltimore Catechism describes the purposes of marriage thus:

(1) To enable the husband and wife to aid each other in securing the salvation of their souls;

(2) To propagate or keep up the existence of the human race by bringing children into the world to serve God;

(3) To prevent sins against the holy virtue of purity by faithfully obeying the laws of the marriage state

What a gift a good marriage is.  As I said, I can't think of a better marriage partner (or a better father for my sons) than the guy I married.  If I do make it to Heaven, he will have most definitely helped me to get there. What an example he has been for me!  I can only hope that by the time my life here is over, I will have learned to live out my Faith with the kind of purpose and passion that he does.

Forty-one years in, and our family has grown by leaps and bounds.  Just a portion of us were together on Christmas Day, and look at how many dear souls are in this picture!  

That day, we had only 13 of our 17 grandchildren with us (Peanut, one of the triplets, escaped before the photo was taken, so if you count them up you'll only find 12!).

But the two soon-to-be-born grandchildren were also there.  Here are my sweet girls who are expecting in 2022, one in February and the other in April.

That 22-year-old bride in the first picture up there could never have imagined how big and beautiful her family would become. All I can say is IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE (my favorite Christmas movie, BTW).  And it all got started on this date in 1980.

Christmas Celebration Preparations

I just realized that I forgot to push the "publish" button on this post this morning.  Oops!  So I'm sending it out a tad late.

Good morning, dear readers!  And happy day before Christmas Eve! 

I’m  just sitting here by the light of the tree, drinking coffee and thinking warm thoughts, getting excited for the coming days.  (Our super awesome overlit Griswold family tree has many light settings, and this one is the candy cane/red-and-white-lights-only option.  The photo doesn't do it justice; but isn't it pretty?)

This will be our fifth Christmas in VA.  And each year since we've been here living near our four oldest sons, we've floated the idea that since we get to see them so often throughout the year, we would be okay with having a family celebration on some date before or after the 25th, so that they can either stay home on Christmas with just their little ones or enjoy time with their kids' grandparents and aunts and uncles on their moms' side.

But in spite of the lack of pressure to spend Christmas Day itself with us, that seems to be what most of our VA peeps actually want to do!  Our youngest son is in MI with his wife's family this Christmas.  But the four sons who live near us down here have all agreed that an Open House party at Papa and Grammy's centrally located home is a good idea.  So as long as everyone stays healthy until Christmas, we could have as many as 33 people here that afternoon: 16 adults (including not just our four sons and their wives, but a couple sets of their in-laws, plus the brother and girlfriend of one daughter-in-law) and 17 kids.  

Because the group is so large and figuring out how to time a sit-down meal is pretty much impossible (believe me, we've tried, and it gets complicated; especially with people driving from 1/2 hour to an hour away, with babies and small children and their nap schedules to figure in--not to mention Christmas Day overexcitement!).  So this year, we are having a come-when-you-can, stay-as-little-or-long-as-you-like, heavy hors d'oeuvres and snacks, old-fashioned cocktail party kind of a party. 

We have tried cooking a beef tenderloin for our gang here.  We have tried a buffet-style menu, with lasagna and pulled pork and other hot casserole-type items in chafing dishes.  We keep fine-tuning, trying to figure out what we can manage best without a staff of catering professionals on hand to make sure all goes smoothly and everything stays hot.  (A quick aside here: How positively dreamy does a catered party sound?!)  So I am actually kind of excited about trying this more relaxed format for a Pearl family party, and I've been working on my menu.  Here are the items I'm planning so far: Swedish meatballs; cocktail weiners in barbecue sauce; piglets in blankets (yes, Little Smokies are going to play a major role in this shindig!); deli meats and slices of deep-fried turkey (my husband has always wanted to try cooking a turkey this way); rolls for sandwich making; Tostitos with salsa and guacamole; Buffalo chicken dip with Fritos; loaded baked potato dip with Ruffles; Pimento cheese dip with crackers; veggies and dip platter; baked stuffed mushrooms; deviled eggs; fruit. There may be more items added, but that’s it so far.  And the guests are bringing stuff to share as well.   (I'll also have mac and cheese as a backup for any picky eaters in the younger crowd!) I have crockpots for keeping the meatballs and Little Smokies warm, but most of the foods we'll have out won't need to be heated.  I THINK this is going to be our most stress-free party yet.

For dessert, I'm making a red velvet bundt cake with cream cheese frosting and several batches of Christmas cookies, and I've also got plenty of store-bought goodies, too, including lots of chocolates and chocolate-covered treats.

If you have any egg allergies in your family, like we do, these are great
(and easy!) eggless cookies: 1 box red velvet cake mix, 1/2 c. water,
1/2 c. oil, white chips, and sprinkles; bake at 350 for 8 minutes.

I will break out some of my pretty Christmas platters and serving dishes (because if they never get used, why even have them?), but otherwise, it's going to be paper and plastic all the way, so there won't be much to clean up afterward.  (She throws her head back and guffaws loudly, remembering that after every giant family party--disposable plates or not--she and her husband joke that perhaps it would be easier to torch the place than to clean it!)

I've been collecting party supplies here and there for the past month.  The planning part of having a
party is one of my favorite activities. :)

BTW, do these chips look fun to you...or sort of gross?  (I’m going with fun.)

I'm going to take a break for the next few days, until the excitement dies down, and just enjoy being in the moment with all the people I love most.  But here's wishing you all a blessed Christmas.  Joy to the World!    Let earth receive her King!