My Happy Birthday :)

Last Saturday was my birthday. To celebrate, I put together a dinner party. A real one. With real dishes, real silverware, enough seating for all the guests, appetizers and centerpieces on the tables.  Everything!
We had some RARE mild weather that day, with temps around 60 degrees at dinnertime, so we even had a fire going outside.
If you're a blog stalker like me, you caught the 31 Days Series that was put on by several popular bloggers during the month of October. One of the bloggers was The Reluctant Entertainer. I had never heard of her before, and the first post or two only had me mildly interested. But after a few days I was looking forward to the daily post. Next thing I knew, I had decided that I want to take our entertaining up just a notch or two. I've always loved hosting all the family get togethers. We usually do all the holidays here. And almost every weekend we have the kids and grandkids over for dinner.
But now that our home is a little larger (A big great room was at the very top of our NEEDS list when we were house hunting) I think I'd like to take it just a little farther. Have dinner guests more often. Build those connections with the people in our lives. Slow down a little and enjoy what  those who matter most.
So I kicked off this crazy plan of mine with a birthday celebration. For me!
I chose to serve an Indian Food FEAST because Indian food is one of my absolute favorites.

The Menu

(recipes coming soon)

Appetizers of nuts, cheese, crackers, etc.

Basmati Rice with Spiced Cauliflower

Sindhi Spinach

Chicken Tikka Masala

Sindhi Chicken Curry

Saag Panir

North Indian Rice Pudding

Also traditional Indian "condiments"

Cucumber Raita

Cilantro Mint Chutney

Peach Chutney

I prepared the food over the course of the week prior to the party. Indian food lends itself really well to preparing ahead and freezing. I only had to prepare the rice and the Raita on the day of the party. Easy peasy!
Several of my friends asked me, as if I had lost my mind, why I was doing all the "work" for my own birthday party. Roger even offered to have it catered. But this is TRULY what I love doing. I love the actual cooking. The stir of a wooden spoon in a great big pot. The scents and the colors! And the "gift" of preparing food for people I love. And, I admit, seeing people enthusiastically enjoy what I've made for them kinda strokes my ego. Sue me.
I wanted to invite a few more people than we really had room for, so I had to remind  myself that I want to do this often. So I saved some friends for later. ;)
This time I invited (REAL invitations! Well, real in the way that Facebook is real these days. lol) 

Our neighbors from our old house

Lori and JR

Dennis and Christy

My Mom, Aunt Verna and brother Steve

the three of whom somehow escaped the camera. :(

I was having so much fun I forgot to get the camera out till later so they might have left by the time I handed the camera to Heather and asked her to take some pictures for me.

Of course our girls were there

 Kayleigh and Richard

Crystal and Travis

Heather and David

Jaxon and the grandbabies had a blast playing with his toys and Rock Band with the bigger kids

Jaxon and Caydance

(There's Becky too!)

Tukker and her Mommy

Athena

And Maveryk with his Daddy

I guess Indian food isn't Tukker's favorite because at one point her Mom found her inside a cupboard eating a stick of butter.

Not a bad second choice in my opinion. ;)

I had such a great birthday! I really enjoyed spending the evening with wonderful people. I received some very generous gifts. One of which is a gift card which I'm planning to use to buy The Reluctant Entertainer (the book, not the blogger!) to help me prepare for lots more of these great evenings.

Thanks to everyone who was there! You really kicked off my next year of this crazy life with a bang!

And special thanks to my handsome hubby. I'm not sure this whole "REAL entertaining" thing is something he'd pursue on his own. But he loves me and supports me and helped me make it great. He's one of the good guys. Love you honey!