Fire, Fire, Fire

So last week I decided that it was time for a party. The weather is getting nicer and we don't see our friends enough. It was all started in a conversation that I had with Lori of the fun time we had when they would have a "fire pit" at her house. SoI figured it was time to get the usual cast of characters together but also invite some other friends that we haven't seen in quite a while. I figure that we can play cards and get the Wii out and also I can initiate the fire pit that I got for Christmas and get rid of the twigs and stuff that have accumulated in the back yard for the past year. So Jen and I go into typical planning mode with conversation about the menu and other stuff. I tore apart the front room and cleaned the carpet for the event as well. We decided to just do a snack kind of thing to make it quick and simple. Even though I sent out an email invite to everyone that I have an email for, we still ended up calling some people Saturday at the last minute since we just kept forgetting. We had a pretty decent crowd with at least 3 couples not making it due to being out of town on that night. It started out pretty slow (which the usually do) but it gave us a chance to catch up with a friend of ours who we hadn't seen in years. For the menu we had Carries chocolate chip cookies, layer dip, shrimp cracker spread, chips and dip, and the required carmel corn. We also bought a case of beer and the makings for margarittas since you never really know what people would want to drink. Even though in this day and age with all of our friends being older and having kids they usually stick to pop. We made the party kid friendly since we have kids and alot of or friends do too. The kids seemed to have a blast outside on the playset and all played well together without any major incidents or injuries. Since Keith has a Wii also we had him bring over his games to play. He brought over guitar hero. This is my first chance to actually play this game on the Wii. It's a pretty fun game and I can see how people really enjoy it, but I am more into the racing and shoot em up kind of thing. So the adults are trying guitar hero out and trying to get through one song when the kids realize that we are playing games and now THEY want to play games, so yeah we lost control of the Wii shortly after that. So I am walking around and talking to people and being the good host and realize that it is getting pretty dark outside. I wasn't sure about starting the fire since everyone seemed to be happy playing the Wii and talking. I was going to start a card game on the kitchen table, but it was being used for a conversation area so I just put the cards in the middle of the table and if a card game broke out, so be it. But I finally decided to start the fire up. I had been putting in limbs, twigs, and leaves in this above ground fire pit all year and decided that if I could at least get rid of that it would give me more room for the next couple of weeks. I had filled the fire pit almost up to the top with stuff and didn't think it would be that big of a fire, but after finally getting it started it turned into a HUGE ass fire with flames at least 7 feet high (oops). My brother in law Jim said that my father in law would be proud for the amount of flame. Lucky for me I had it situated the fire pit so nothing was near and I had planned ahead and had a garden hose handy, just in case.


The children in the background look closer than they actually were so don't worry. So the flames finally calmed down and I was standing out there drinking a beer and tending to the fire. I had a garbage can of other twigs that I had collected last year so I had some extra ammo in case we wanted to hang out a little longer. Nothing like a roaring fire when it's 80 degrees outside. People drifted in and out of the house and the party started breaking up after a while. But Keith and I kept watch over the fire and worked on solving the world's problems. At one point Andrew picked up my empty beer and tried to hand it to me. I told him it was empty and to put it down. He instead took the beer into the house and told Jenny "empty". All I heard was laughter from the house for a while and Jen yelling at me since she thought I sent him on a mission for more beer. That was just a bonus that happened. A little while later we sent Keith's son Charlie and Jarod on a mission for more beer. It's great having kids. A while later (and a few more beers later) Keith and I still hadn't solved the worlds problems, but we were running out of stuff to burn and beer. I counted 9 soldiers from the battlefield that I bought back into the house between the two of us. Man I haven't done that in ages. So it's after midnight when everyone decided to call it a night. Keith gave up his keys so don't worry about that, and I was home so I didn't have to worry about that either. So we put the kids to bed and did a quick clean up and put anything perishable away and fell asleap downstairs. I woke up around 5:00am and went to bed whereupon Christopher wakes up at 6:00am and then for good at 7:00am. Wow that's early. I am tired and have a little bit of a hangover, but I get ready and go to church. The rest of the Sunday was playing with the kids and trying to catch a nap when I could. Overall I think everyone had a good time. Those event are fun to do, and maybe we can do it again in a while.