Baby Shower On Steriods.

Last weekend we hosted the baby shower at our place. This is a distinctly american tradition. Usually its given by a friend of the mother to be and its a strictly women only affair. We decided to break with a tradition a bit and just use it as an excuse to have a big party. We in fact ended up with 60 people ( 50 adults and 10 kids ).

The preparation started the day before with some serious cooking -- 27 pounds of meat were bought and 22 pounds ended up being cooked... I manned the smoker and the grill for around eight hours. Although once the smoker was finished it was plain sailing as I have a wireless temp monitor. When things are on the gas grill under indirect heat I can just go inside and drink wine. Which is what I ended up doing as some of our friends came over that night and we played a few games of clue ( cluedo for the brits )! great start!

The other dishes were brought by the guests on the day - pot luck style - and that worked out great -- I was very impressed -- there was certainly an amazing gauntlet of deserts!

On the day things went swimmingly! -- the weather was kind ( especially considering that the day after it rained cats and dogs ) -- and the atmosphere festive. I personally had a great time playing the whole social butterfly role -- meeting and greeting as many people as I could! while imbibbing as much drink as possible -- I think/hope everyone else had a good time too -- I'm certainly thankful for the attendance level as I don't know what we would have done with all that meat:-)

Lastly I would like to thank everybody for there generously provided gifts! -- I'm sure they will all come in handy and they are certainly very appreciated -- its great to know that we have so many good friends....