The big party...a recap :-)

It's taken me a while to do this, because we've all been sick & busy. No matter, I have time now, so here goes. 

So, as a reminder of what I'm talking about I threw my hubby, Aaron, a big surprise 30th birthday bash. It was fabulous and a LOT of work. We had a big mongolian hot pot sit down dinner with rented table settings ta boot! I got Aaron out the door at around noon, off to his dad's to watch sports all day. Before he leaves though, he declares that he'll probably just stay for a little while & come home because he's just not 'feeling it'. I stopped in my tracks, and tried to come up with something to say without spilling the beans, but under NO circumstances can he come home early damn it! My response was 'NO, you know you'll have a great time once you get there...guy time, no kids, sports, laying - what's not to love?!' As he stepped out the door, I gave a call to his dad to warn him about Aaron's attitude in hopes that he could be really convincing. MY cover was that I was going to be cleaning carpets all day (hence the couch that I needed help moving before he left). 

So, Aaron left & I began to set up...first cleaning up a little bit. I couldn't be too obvious after all. Earlier I had done some cleaning, but normal cleaning is usually a few rooms at a time, where as party clean is everything at the same time. My mother in law came by to help & we got started with the actual party set up. We had 3 big tables to set, and 6 big hot pots to prepare. It took us all afternoon, but by 6, we were ready...with a few power outages under our belts too. (6 hot pots all plugged in at the same time, is a lot! We played around with it though & finally found enough plugs that were spread out enough that we made it work.)

Wine - check, food - check...now we just waited for people, and I changed my clothes (thank god). I didn't look great, but I was clean so I thought that was pretty good. ;-)

People started to arrive & finally I got to call Aaron home.

Aaron came home, we all shouted surprise & the party began. He said he wondered if something was up, by the time 4pm rolled around & he called to check in & I emphatically encouraged him to stay. Though, under NO circumstances did he have ANY clue that I was doing a huge hot pot thing with so many friends at our house.

We all ate and ate and ate. It was super yummy & so fun to see everyone enjoying it. Hours later, we had cake too, with wine all along the way. It was fantastic and a great success. I looked like total crap by the end because I was sweating so much running around trying to keep everything working (with a few more power outages scattered throughout the evening) - my bangs were all kinky & matted, but oh well. People didn't really start to head home til 10:30pm, and a few stayed til 2:30am. 

Here are the only pictures I got from the evening, but sadly the birthday boy wasn't in any of them: