The quantities below will make enough for about 15 people:

5 cups freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 15 oz container frozen raspberry puree*
3 cups sugar (superfine or baker’s is best)
12 cups filtered water

Make a simple syrup by placing 3 cups of water plus 3 cups superfine sugar in a non-stick sauce pan. Boil for about 2 minutes then let cool to room temperature.

Squeeze 5 cups worth of fresh lemons and pour into a large serving container. Add cooled simple syrup, 9 cups of water plus defrosted raspberry puree. Stir well and refrigerate overnight for best results.

*I didn’t have time to make homemade raspberry puree so I purchased ‘Perfect Puree’ at Whole Foods. Not cheap but really good!

If you want to throw a similar shower and need help or advice, please contact me!

I have about two more days of photos and details to post – stay tuned!

The Bessers are officially weekend espresso maniacs, enjoying hosting our friends on Saturday mornings for coffee and conversation. Sometimes, too, a coffee AM becomes a coffee PM (one lasted till almost 5pm… really!).

In a lot of respects, they are the new dinner parties for us because it can be difficult to coordinate schedules when you want to get together with more than one family. Maybe it’s just the Bay Area but everyone has A LOT going on and available Friday/Saturday nights seem to be at a premium.

So, we think we’ve found a great solution in our monthly coffees. They give us quality time with friends and the pace is a little slower than an evening event (especially for me as I am not that skilled on our Italian Vibiemme machine). I highly recommend them as a way to connect with friends and neighbors. If you host one soon, would you please leave me a comment about how it went?

Our next Coffee AM is tomorrow morning – if you are a FRL (that is, a friend in “real” life) please stop by and join us. We usually start around 8am!

P.S. Dane made strawberry pancakes today… my boy is on fire in the kitchen these days!

My friend, Nina, is amazingly clever. Not only does she throw fabulous parties (a girl after my own heart), but she comes up with incredible take home favors for the guests, too. As we left her recent New Year’s Eve party, she handed us FOUR goodies bags: two for Paul and me and two for our boys who had opted to stay home (hooray for teenage sons who can babysit!).

In the adult bags, Nina had a bottle of water, an apple and jump rope. In the kid bags, Nina had hackey sacks in place of the jump ropes – all items to promote good health in 2011. I am definitely borrowing this idea for one of our next parties!

How about you, readers? Any good party favor ideas to share with us?

So tomorrow, Chez Besser, is another ‘coffee morning’ from 8-10am if you can join us. Hope to see you there!

kathy+paul+dane+tate+scout-the-dog

Does anyone want to share what they’ve done for love? I would love to hear it. Thanks for strolling down memory lane with me this week. Have a terrific weekend!

P.S. If you want to check out my suggestive (and deliberately mangled French) menu, please go to http://dirtandsunshine.com/assetlibrary/parties/2005_Valentine-menu.pdf (the explanation of the food items may be found here: http://dirtandsunshine.com/assetlibrary/parties/2005_Valentine-menu_trans.pdf )
 

Damn… if only families could keep ex-girlfriends and ex-boyfriends around like extra siblings. That would be so cool. Then my family could enjoy Doug, my ex-fiance, more than once a decade. He is, I’m happy to report, still friends with me but doesn’t see my family very often. He’s a terrific writer, too. I am surrounded by so many writers (my brother is married to one, for instance) – now I just have to figure out how to make off with some of their talent. Any ideas, folks?

P.S. The kid handwriting entry is Dane’s. He and Tate would not leave the Chocolate&Wine party for anything! Would you? If you’re curious about the evening’s menu, you may view it here: http://dirtandsunshine.com/assetlibrary/parties/2005_Chocolate&Wine_menu.pdf – enjoy!
 

The one that takes the cake, however, goes all the way back to 2004. I organized a trip to Spain for twenty-five friends (including a couple, Kristie and Lee, who GOT MARRIED while we were over there*).

Since we had 18 adults who knew each other mainly through Paul and me, we decided to kick off the first night’s dinner with a little game of ‘3 Adjectives’.  Mathew, who is tall and English, wrote, “tall, English, slightly balding” on his card. When the time came for me to read it aloud, I doubled over with laughter and couldn’t get the words out. It was so perfectly snarky (and quintessentially Mathew). It took me minutes to recover and when I finally choked out the words, everyone laughed. The ice was definitely, and very memorably, broken. For the remainder of the trip, I kept having the giggles over Mathew’s boldly stating the obvious.
 
*The wedding was organized in less than 24 hours by Kristie, Larisa, Francesca and me. We picked a venue (outside a monastery, literally on the side of a cliff!), purchased flowers and made bouquets, found 3 cakes at the local bakery and got enough food to feed all 25 of us. The 7 kids made up the bridal party and the adults (save Larisa, who officiated) were witnesses. Mathew (Francesca’s husband) photographed the ceremony and reception. It was truly one of the most charming weddings I’ve ever attended.
 
P.S. The ones below are a few personal favorites – can you guess which are male and which are female? A prize to the first person to correctly guess all six!
 

I thought it was one of the best party games I’ve ever played and that’s saying a lot from a girl who ALMOST ALWAYS has an ice breaker game at parties.

The print-ready PDF is available in two parts (3MB each) and may be found on my website at http://dirtandsunshine.com/party-ideas.html. If you’re interested in other ice breaker games I’ve created, they may be found at http://dirtandsunshine.com/sangria-party.html. April was kind enough to give me permission to share her idea (that’s her and husband, Mike, in the photo below along with their daughter and April’s lovely parents). The photo above is of Paul and me aka ‘Brian Wilson and his Spider-Lady Date’ (I think my Foley+Corinna dress from Bella Rosa in Los Gatos makes a perfect faux spider web!).

If you have any fun party games you’d like to share, please let me know!

P.S. You play the murder-mystery game by giving each guest a clue. Tell them they have one hour to gather as much information as possible and spin a tale of who died and how. There is no “official” version of events; April awarded me the prize because she thought mine was the most creative (she says she liked it better than her original version). If you are interested in hearing my theories, please email me (kathy@dirtandsunshine.com).

Since I’m not quite finished with the formatting of the murder mystery game handout, I’ve decided to throw in a little ‘peek at the past’ to kick off what I hope will be “Party Games Week” around here (at least on the blog). The one below is one of my personal favorites.

At several of our sangria parties, we’ve played the ‘6-Word Memoir’ Game. If you haven’t heard of the book, ‘Not Quite What I Was Expecting: Six-Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure’, I highly encourage you to check it out. The official website for the magazine behind the effort is at http://www.smithmag.net/sixwords/ – you can even submit your own 6-word memoir there.

Please note in Tate’s entry below the word is “solar” not “sober” – his handwriting and spelling are creatively attrocious, to say the least.

Please leave your 6-word memoir in the comments below (and perhaps vote for your favorite among the 7 samples) – I would love to hear from you!