The December Octoberfest

So we had our party and it was a success!

Two granddaughters wanted to earn money so they came on Friday night and we started cleaning up the house. We ended up just stacking things in the garage just to get all of the ongoing projects out of the house. We set up the 2 bedrooms for guests to stay over, we knew our friend from Pasadena would stay and wanted to be ready for anyone else.

By 3 pm I had to start cooking and made: Hot German Potato Salad, Goulash, Warm Red Cabbage Salad, Choucroute Garnie, and Chicken Paprika. When I’ve visited my friends in Germany we have eaten lots of meat; my friend Dieter will say that meat is a vegetable. Knowing this I wanted good hardy meat dishes made with lots of Paprika. I’ve made all of these dishes before except for the Chicken but it sounded good and flavorful so there it was.

I’d mapped out the work time to prepare the meal so by the time everyone arrived food was about ready, yum!

We’d invited our oldest friends from the Annual days plus newer friends but only our oldest friends attended this time. It really didn’t matter, we had such a good time visiting with our old friends. These are our closest friends but we only see some when we have our parties, and others 2 or 3 times a year. When we do get together we have lots to talk about.

This year was fun because our party was held just before Christmas we gave out a Christmas gift to each friend as they left our house. I’d made several tote bags out of organic colorgrown cotton and gave these to the very closest friends. My granddaughter took a Trader Joe’s paper sack and inside put some tissue. For those receiving the tote she wrapped and put into the tote a bottle of Navarro Wine and a calendar then put the tote into the sack closing it with a wire twisty. For the other friends she put a bottle of wine and a calendar in the bag.

We did receive enough food to fill 2 boxes for Optimal Hospice plus bed linens from neighbors and more bags of food from them as well. Optimal Hospice was so happy to receive everything so it was successful night.