DINNER PARTY

Taylor does this thing where he agrees to outlandish things without taking a second to think about them or to consult with Shane. Like that time (two weeks ago) when he agreed to host his entire family of 15 to stay in our brand new house… two weeks after we got the keys.

Well, then it shouldn’t surprise anyone to hear that he has also agreed to host Thanksgiving in our new house with all of Shanes family and a couple of friends — a group of 20 people. Our dining room table seats eight. The last time we agreed to host was a Friendsgiving party in New York. The house looked immaculate, everything was ready to go, and just as we went to put the turkey in the oven three hours before dinner was to be served, Taylor realized that turkeys from the grocery store are frozen solid. Our table full of friends did get to eat their delicious Thanksgiving dinner… at 10:30pm. Luckily, we kept the drinks flowing and by the time the turkey was finally served, we had convinced our friends that it was Christmas AND Christ had risen all in the same night. Thank God for the blood of Christ. Amen.

This year Tay swears things will be different. He will have all of his ducks… turkeys, in a row. Okay enough third person — this is Taylor and to be honest I’m freaking out a little bit. Shane’s entire family is notoriously incredible at hosting. Their table settings always look perfect, their food always tastes OUT OF THIS WORLD incredible and their playlist is usually the perfect blend of oldies and Josh Groban songs that make you want to cry directly into your mashed potatoes. I know Shane’s family will never judge me for the inevitable mess they are going to experience this Thanksgiving, but we are really proud of our new house and just want things to go well. Alas, if things do end up falling apart we will just fill their bellies with frozen turkey and excessive amounts of Christ’s blood, and tell them all the truth about Thanksgiving.

Today I ran some errands and picked up a few things that we’ve needed to decorate the house for fall and prepare for this mess of a party we’re putting together for Thanksgiving. I went to some stores looking for wreaths for the front door and realized how incredibly expensive they are. I decided to go to a craft store, buy all of the pieces required for a wreath, and make it myself. Luckily, my D.I.Y. project kind of worked out and it ended up costing less than half as much as the pre-made ones.

Yesterday we also picked up our “new” porch furniture that we bought from our neighbors down the street for $20. They are retiring to Italy and are selling a lot of the stuff in their home… their oh-so-beautiful and absolutely perfect home.

Side story: We actually wanted to buy their house when we first started our house hunt, but didn't because it didn’t have the space for us to grow as a family. When we first walked up to their house for the open house, they greeted us out on their gorgeous screened-in porch. They were a gay couple and explained how they had lived in the home for 20+ years, which meant that they must’ve moved in right about when they were our age. It was like the clouds parted and gay Jesus looked down at us and winked. As they turned around and walked inside to give us a tour of their home, I grabbed Shane by the arm and whispered into his ear, “We are buying this fucking house!”

It was the most beautiful Dutch Colonial I’ve ever seen. It oozed charm. It’s the kind of house that welcomes you in with big warm open arms, sets you down in front of the fireplace on a cozy leather couch, and hands you a hot cocoa. Oh and Bill is a horticulturalist so the landscaping around the house was immaculate. I’m pretty sure there are more species of plants in Bob and Bill’s backyard than in the entire Amazon rainforest. Like I said, we didn’t end up getting the house, but we did get the owners’ contact info and told them that we wanted to purchase some of their porch furniture if they were looking to sell. Well, they were looking to sell and we ended up doing just that. We also developed a fast friendship and have gone out for drinks with our newly-acquired fairy gay uncles and they even invited us over to their porch for a delicious homemade meal and to try out their furniture that would soon become ours. We are so happy we decided to attend their open house on Macalester St. a couple of months ago and even more happy that we now have our very own place on Macalester just a block down from theirs. Down below you can see photos of what we did with their porch furniture. And for the record, we tried to give them $60, but they wouldn’t take it. Little do they know, they will have $40 waiting in their mailbox when they get to Italy…

Alright, that was a very long intro into what is really just a bunch of photos of our “new” porch furniture and me practicing my table settings for what will be our first dinner party in our new house. I’m not even sure that the forks and spoons are on the right sides. I always ask Shane if I did it right but he’s still at work, so…

Cheers! To frozen Turkeys, the blood of Christ, and the most delightful new neighbors who happen to be moving to the other side of the world in a week…

Love,

Shane, Taylor + Barley

Here’s the $25 D.I.Y. wreath that I made today.

And the $20 porch furniture from our fairy gay uncles, Bob and Bill.

The place mats and napkins are from Macy’s. The plates and silverware are hand-me-downs from Shane’s Great Aunt Liz.

Some people wouldn’t appreciate the wear/age on the table and chairs, but we’re both middle children so we love a good hand-me-down.

I used the leftover bits from my D.I.Y. wreath project as a detail for each place setting.

We love the simplicity and patina of these directors chairs. They are a classic design and we hope to have them for many years to come.

What do you think? Are we going to survive our first Thanksgiving? Would you have dinner at our house?