Dip!

Sometimes, creating a home means creating a home for more than just our immediate family. Sometimes it means providing a nest, an atmosphere of love, peace, joy and safety for others that come into our lives. Our life is but a brief blip on an eternal screen, but what we do with our resources makes all the difference. It has been our aim for many years, especially since having teenagers, to foster a sense of home for everyone who walks through our front (or back!) door, short or long term. Our lives should always be invested in others, for their benefit, but also for the enriching of our own lives. Our guest book is full of a variety of names and faces...middle aged married couples like us, orphaned Ugandan children here for a visit, grandparents, cousins, students, Canadians, South Africans, Filipinos, young and old...each one with a unique memory. Some stayed a night or two, others for a year or more.

Our Kentucky Pie Girl, Jessie is leaving us. She has been a wonderful addition to our family for the past year, staying in one of our extra bedrooms and filling our home with her insights, passions, GRE study vocabulary, and her love. We wanted to celebrate her and her accomplishments with a proper party. We strung up lanterns and gathered the goodies. Though she has a penchant for Mountain Dew and candy, she appreciates good food, and has an as-yet-undeveloped sixth sense in the kitchen. She LOVES dips. So we threw her a party full of dips and good friends. This wasn't really a "cooking night" per se, but everyone brought their favorite dips and dippers, and we ate more than we could calculate, exchanging recipes in the process.

Warning: Dips can be a very high calorie meal, b/c you eat them without really gauging how much you're eating! Here is a sampling...

Guacamole.................Spinach Artichoke......................Bean Salsa

Mexican layers......................Onion Dip...............................White Pizza

After we gorged ourselves on entirely too many grams of fat, we worked it off by playing a rowdy game of Reverse Charades, which I highly recommend. The highlight was when one-year-old Iris Ray served as a perfect Mufasa prop, being hoisted high to act out "The Lion King."

Many kind words were spoken and well-wishes given. Jessie is off to work on a Masters in Social Work at the University of Chicago. She's going to do GREAT. We'll miss her, and she'll really miss us, especially when the chill wind begins to howl over Lake Michigan.

Happy Dipping! (and stay warm Jessie!)

A No-Cooking Cooking Night

April has arrived, with its temperamental temperatures and an occasional warm evening. Out with the soups, in with the salads! There were ten of us around the table (that's outdoor table) tonight, so a pasta salad for a crowd was in order. This one is easy to multiply; just a little more pasta, a little more of this, and a little more of that stretches it to feed an army. I love the way this main course salad brings in so many colors...it just looks like spring.

I'm always at a loss to find suitable accessories to a pasta salad; everything is already there - the starch, the vegetables, the meat. It's a complete meal, but it seems so lonely on the table. A few of the girls have been swooning over dips lately. So, I decided a trio of dips with an assortment of vehicles (aka chips, crackers, pretzels) would be an appropriate accompaniment. And a cool sipping dessert for our fireside chat...

Menu: Asian Pasta Salad
Guacamole, Cajun Seafood Dip, Salsa
Root Beer Floats

Although this salad does have a lot of ingredients, it's pretty easy to throw together, especially when you use some lovely shortcuts like a pre-roasted chicken. It takes little skill, just the ability to follow a list of ingredients, and has a decent wow factor, because it's so pretty.

And did I mention what a large crowd it feeds?

We had to kick brother Jon out of the kitchen...his calculus homework and tickling little sister was not going to facilitate getting dinner on the table in time. But it does a mama's heart good to have some laughter in the house among siblings.

Some lovely flowers, compliments of Lisa. Thanks, Lisa!

Conversation tonight? Jon was still working on his calculus homework, so more girl stuff...what girls are looking for in a man, toes, undergarments, second graders, R-E-S-P-E-C-T, no more monkeys jumping on the bed, and nurturing. Diverse topics, to be sure.

I feel like each time I get together with these young women, I am being challenged and stretched to think outside my box. My 1970s/80s box. The one I grew up in. My middle-aged woman box. The one I'm in now. They are my daughter's friends, fast becoming mine, but clearly I AM old enough to be their mom. Gosh, some of their moms are younger than I! I am glad they want to come over and cook with me on Mondays. I appreciate hearing the way they look at the world, the obstacles and frustrations they face, the victories they enjoy, maybe because their predecessors fought those battles already. I'm not into this age-segregation thing, where I have to hang out only with women my age. I don't think that's the way God intended it to be. The generations have something to share with each other.