Party-Prep for the Party of the Century

On Thursday (the 9th) both my parents and Cheryl's parents came into town. To celebrate their meeting, we (I) decided that we all should go to BJ's, and that they should all partake of my most favorite BBQ Chicken Pizza, followed by the ever so scrumptious Pazookie. After that my parents left, and I stayed to help make cute little apple pies. We were making so many that we ran out of ingredients, so I ran to the store to fetch more. Unlucky for me, my car was still over at the temple apartments from when I picked the parents up, so I had to get 'exercise'! ugh. Making apple pies was fun, and laborsome. I think almost everyone working with them cut their fingers somehow. Cheryl was washing stuff and a knife jumped up and bit her finger pretty good (unfortunately, of course).

So I took last Friday off in order to prepare for 'the Party of the Century'. Lots of family was coming to town, and I had to help them coordinate the with the 'Set-Up' efforts. We had our day all mapped out, but nothing seemed to fit just right into our pre-suggested schedule, that we wanted it to fit into.
I had lots of running around to do, things to buy, stuff to pick up, and so on. I'd stop by Pelham to drop stuff off now and then. Around noon when I stopped there I was greeted by what seemed like a herd of kids all racing round the apartment. I froze as I entered, to analyze the situation. For a moment I thought that we were under invasion by an adorable little-person army. My fright only lasted a few moments until about 3 of them all started yelling 'Uncle Jim' all at the same time. I wanted to question each of them, as to how they knew me, but my schedule didn't allow for that. Luckily Cheryl explained. Cheryl's sisters and parents were hard at work making the coolest little pies ever (part of our party favors).

Later that day, as all our families were assembling, we planned to all meet at the Stake Center. Unfortunately I hadn't planned on the building being locked! I didn't plan on that at all. So a lot of us had to practice our patience for a while, while some of the smaller children started roaming randomly around the neighborhood. Fortunately my mom called me with an address of a member of the stake presidency, so Cheryl and I ran over to his house to plead our case, and ask for a key. So then the set-up procedure began.

Just as we finished setting up, we all marched over to El Cholo for dinner. It was a big sigh of relief knowing that the big and heavy, and timely parts of the set-up were done with. So I could then feast in peace. And boy was it good. I don't remember much of it, only that I didn't get enough refills, and I wanted ice cream afterwords.