Fri Feb 2: Shabbat at My Place - Are you feeling spoiled yet? Three posts in three days?

Several days ago, I asked Adrienne and Jeff if they were hosting Shabbat dinner this week. They said they'd *love* to have dinner with me, just not at their house this week. They even turned me down when I said I'd come help clean. *giggle*

So I volunteered to play hostess, which worked out really nicely because I was able to invite Melissa (Meala) to an "official" Shabbat dinner, instead of just "let's hang out and have food because we're spending so many hours together." Yes, she was coming over for some sewing anyways, but I really was glad I could be the one hosting because I could invite my friends to join me.

Also, Laura (Aliskye) wanted to volunteer to help make arm bands for the Rapier Fencers at Estrella (basically, a piece of cloth tied to your upper-arm so you can tell that all these dozens of fighters are part of your team). The only free time she had was after work on Friday, which was perfect because I could invite her to stay for dinner, too.

And my roommate Melissa (or Mel, to avoid confusion) and her boyfriend Tom were able to join us, so I had the lovely pleasure of serving dinner for seven... in a kitchen normally set up for only 2-3 people! *whee* We added a card table to the end of the kitchen table and squished all the chairs in closely. I cooked a pot of rice, a skillet full of stir-fried veggies, and a separate skillet of marinaded chicken (since Mel, my roomie, is a vegetarian, and this way everyone could choose how much of anything for their plate). Melissa made a dessert for us with lemon sorbet, ginger cookies, and baked it like Baked Alaska in merangue, which turned out really yummy. We'll remember to use more shortbread-like cookies or cake next time, but it was still really delicious.

Tom and Mel took off early for an evening engagement, and the five of the rest of us just hung out chatting and working on various sewing projects. Melissa make a gorgeous new Persian coat for herself (and underdress) for tomorrow's event, and so I pinned the hem for her on the coat and trimmed the hem on the white underdress. She also finished sewing some of her new red fighting tabard with her fighting unit (called the Dragoons). And Laura sewed a zig-zag edge on several of the new arm-bands that I "cut out" on Wednesday. (I put "cut" in quotes, because I ripped them to the correct size, without much use for scissors. *grin*)

And I finished hand-stitching Melissa's new pink hat for tomorrow, by rolling the hem and showing off the dark pink silk lining. The hat was too small at first, but with the hem rolled, it fits much better and will look good with both her Persian outfit and her Elizabethan coat made from the matching embroidered wool.

Now I need to curl up comfortably with the last of my hand-stitching on the wool overdress from 12th Night. I really need to write a new song for tomorrow's event, but I think I'll use the 90-minute drive. If I cannot write a 5-min song on a 90-minute drive, then I'll perform something already in my repetoire, maybe one of the Turkish sagas. There's not much packing to do, so I really need to finish stitching and get to sleep.

Have a lovely weekend everyone!

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Today's Blessing That I'm Thankful For: New friends like Jenn and Jencie. We pass lightly and quickly in each others' lives, over email, but you bring a smile to my evening, and I am thankful for you ladies both.