5.21.2010

garden party


last saturday my little brother graduated from college. aside from completing his five-year bachelor of architecture degree with the highest gpa in his class, he got an award for the "most promising graduate" and was elected to deliver a really fantastic graduation speech at the ceremony. he rocked it and he's basically awesome.
after a delicioso dinner at cantina (um, hello most amazing queso ever), i hosted the parents, grandparents, aaron and his girlfriend gracie for brunch in my backyard the next morning. i had a vision for the meal, and everything actually turned out as planned. and despite all the work, it was really fun putting it all together. i'm not going to lie to you - i'm pretty proud of myself.
and not only was it lovely, but it was cheap!  think the best meal to host guests is breakfast - it always seems to cost less than others to prepare - groceries cost less than $40. i cut the majority of the flowers (early in the morning so no one would see me) from rosebushes at a business down the street - the bushes were huge and i figured they wouldn't miss a few blooms. the white flowers i cut from a vine at my house - total cost for flowers? $4 (for the big purple ones at harris teeter). the place mats came from ikea ($2.50 for 4) and several of the plates (to supplement my own) came from the dollar store. i have finally perfected the art of making tissue paper flowers and hung a bunch in the trees above the table. i think they're the cheapest, prettiest decorations maybe ever. i spent $2 on the tissue. other than that, i already had everything on the table, so this little party set me back about $50. pretty thrifty entertaining!


the menu included coffee, mimosas (probably the main reason i wanted to host a brunch in the first place), fruit salad, blueberry muffins, spinach quiche lorraine (with made-from-scratch crust!), and potatoes. i was really thrilled with the way the quiche turned out - not runny at all and really tasty - you can find the recipe here



overall it was such a blissful morning, sitting around the table with my family, enjoying the morning over delicious (if i may say so) food! aaron may be super smart and artistic, but i'm the hostest with the mostest.

1 comment:

Mickymar said...

What a beautiful table setting. As I look at your quiche? It too looks so yummy. Your elegant table setting is one to be shared as you have done! Beautiful!

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