I showered!

As you can see from the above photo, I didn't mean the wet-and-splashy kind of shower.

Yesterday I threw my first baby shower, for my friend Joy. Her second child, a son (without name - other than her 'affectionate' nickname "lump-o-meat"), is due in about a month.

I just love throwing parties. There is nothing better than looking around once everything has got started and seeing people whose company you enjoy, appreciating the work you've put in on their behalf, as well as having the opportunity to chat with all of them in one day/night.

I think I get this from my parents, whose annual Christmas party was a mini-legend in their circle of friends - everyone knew that when Barry and Pauline threw a party, it was going to be done right. The food would be good-and-plenty, the bar stocked with everything you could wish for, the company dressed-up to the nines and stimulating, the music pounding, and everyone would dance the night away to a mixture of classic East-End post-wartime songs ("Tie a yellow ribbon round the old oak tree...", "Knees up Mother Brown") and current sugary pop songs (think Tiffany's "I think we're alone now"), mixed by your truly. These days, sadly, people rarely dance at at-home parties any more but that doesn't mean I can't have food and drink a-plenty!

So, of course, when my friend Joy got pregnant again, I jumped at the opportunity to host her shower. I threw all caution to the wind and decided that, come surgery, crutches, or canes, I was going to do this no matter what. At the time I had no idea what kind of physical mobility I was going to have just 2 weeks after my surgery, or if I would even feel up to the preparation, so I also enlisted the help of Hubby, who (bless him) agreed instantly to pick-up whatever slack my post-surgery body left in it's party-prep wake. And boy was I thankful for that. While I was busy cooking up a storm, Hubby was vacuuming and cleaning floors, and even had time to make some Sunrise Punch. I also have to recognize him for helping with my first diaper cake; he not only helped rubber-band lord knows how many diapers, he began the assembly process for me. How many husbands do you know who would do that!?

I was pretty impressed with my first diaper-cake attempt... whaddayathink?



Anyway, everything seemed to go swimmingly. My breakfast strata turned out well, my scones weren't bad, my cupcakes were decent, and my party-game went over well. SUCCESS!

If you're interested, you can see more pics here

After the party I was pooped, though. I felt like I'd been hit by a truck. So I gave myself permission to leave the majority of the clean-up until later (as it turned out this morning), changed into my sweats, jumped on the couch, covered myself with a blanket and two dogs, and watched Oxygen channel chick-flicks until Hubby arrived home that evening. It was a deliciously indulgent afternoon.

Today it's clean-up and laundry. Tomorrow it's Monday and the first day I'm going to resume my pre-surgery routine. I'm off to the gym first thing to do some upper-body and core work. I've already moved back up into my office for work, the house is back to it's usual arrangement, and it's almost as if the surgery never happened.

Overall, I couldn't ask for more so soon.