Some Enchanted Evening

Friday night was the best night I have had in a long time.

In celebration of my birthday and our upcoming trip to Paris, I threw a French bistro-themed birthday party, complete with coq au vin, beet salad, fondue, and creme caramel.

This was the first time I have had a party in the three years I have lived in this apartment, and the first time I have cooked an entire meal for eight people EVER. And can I tell you how shocked I was when it all came off so well?

Just LOOK at that coq au vin:

And Amber gave me a fondue set for my birthday, which made for some DELECTABLE bread in cheese dipping. Here she is doing some cheese grating:

And Gloria graciously pretty much made the beet, leek, chevre and frisee salad for me, and also made these yummy prosecco and strawberry puree fizzies:

And I seriously nearly cried with joy when the creme caramel tasted just as good as those I’ve had in restaurants. Perhaps it was a touch uncouth when I announced this at the dinner table and prattled on for a few minutes about HOW AWESOME the dessert that I MADE was, but what can you do?

And Shannon (a fellow Capricorn) and Karman (a Capricorn lover) gave me a truly Capricorned-out beauty package of a nail-polish remover stick (for precision), earthy fall color nail polishes, and a nail file case (which I have been wanting for like FOREVER because I hate how my sunglasses get scratched my the nail files in my purse).

And Laurie, in addition to other awesome gifts, gave me this priceless ugly-70s-food-picture French cookbook:

She also brought along some of those gorgeous Sofia minis. Here’s Shannon enjoying hers:

We all sat around and stuffed ourselves silly and talked about our upcoming Paris trip, and other fun but important stuff, and then Penny and Rachel, who also came over early to help me clean (thanks, ladies!), slept over and we watched Three Men and a Baby and passed out.

And you know? I can’t tell you how important this night was for me. To be surrounded by people who know and love me, and who are all brilliant and interesting and generous and warm in their own quirky ways. To pull off a great meal, when law school pulls the rug out and makes you think that you can’t do anything well.

A truly enchanting evening, and the best way to start 2006.