St. Patty's Day.... Once again

Our young friend C and her mom are coming over for dinner tonight (the dad is still working in Vegas till he makes up his mind about his old job in Louisiana). We were going to go to their house for a pizza dinner, but C's mom is exhausted from the week's trip to Vegas, so I suggested they come here instead. We're still ordering pizza, but from the Italian restaurant (delicious!)rather than Domino's (yuck!).

Knowing how much C appreciates all the frills of a party, I decided to make tonight's pizza dinner another St. Patty's Day celebration. Out came the ivory tablecloth and the green china... the shamrock tree is in the middle of the dining room table, and I made up green placecards decorated with tiny shamrocks. C is still saving all the placecards I've made over the years.... some are pasted into her locker at school, others are on her desk in her room.

I had a quick-mix for a chocolate-cherry bread, so I popped that into the bread machine. I've learned that those flavored-bread mixes come out more like a little cake than a bread, so I'm using that for dessert. When the bread/cake/whatever was done, I let it cool and then sliced it into three layers. Cute little square-shape, filled with cherries, and it came out delicious. The recipe called for 1/2 cup of melted butter, which I just couldn't make myself put into that mix. I used just two tablespoons of butter, then added in apple-butter for the rest. The cake is just perfect, without all that extra fat. Anyway, the little square cake is now a three-layer chocolate-frosted cute little thing, decorated with chopped pecans and a little green elf sitting in the center of it. C will love it, I'm sure.

This is the second time we've had a St. Patty's Day get-together, with not one Irish food on the table. Lots of green, though....

L is going to bring over all the flyers from the houses they looked at in Vegas. She wants us to see what was available out there. We truly already know, because my husband did some searches on the Internet while they were out there. I guess L is just trying to justify her disappointment with the Vegas lifestyle. She doesn't have to justify her opinion with us.... we've been there, and from what we saw, Vegas is probably the last on our list of places we'd wish to live.

Speaking of "last on our list of places we'd wish to live," we can add Russia to that list. My sister and I are watching The Amazing Race again this season, and we both said that although Russia had some beautiful architecture and clean streets, it's still too cold for us. And both of us would've been eliminated from this season's Race as soon as the teams arrived at the Russian swimming pool where they had to dive from a high board and go underwater to retrieve the clue. I know how to swim, but I don't put my head under the water, and there is no way on this green earth that I would voluntarily jump off of a diving board.

"But you could've done that--- you know how to swim!" .... that's what my sister was telling me over the phone the other night. I told her that I don't put my head under the water and that I would not have jumped off the diving board. "Well.... then it's your fault that we can't win a million dollars!!!" I told her that my days of accepting Italian guilt are long gone, and if she really wants a million dollars that badly, then she should sign up for swimming lessons herself.