May 24, 2003 (idea)

Today is “Best Friends’ Day”. This is an idea Xie thought up months ago and has been planned for and delayed and rescheduled multiple times but as I type ten 15/16 year olds sit eating a lovely, somewhat formal 5 course dinner that they prepared themselves.

Ground rules (from the kids):

• This is a dress up occasion
• Share the work

          4 of them cooked the pasta primavera last night
  	2 of them made the pumpkin soup at another house last night
  	1 of them made the plantain egg rolls (a desert item?)
  	1 made cookies
  	1 made and brought salad
  	several brought soda
  	1 brought garlic bread
  	1 made chocolate cloud cake
  		

• From the mom who lives here:
• Yes, there will be photos.
• Encourage them to plan ahead. It takes a lot of work to pull off a sit down dinner for 10.
• Some limited adult help is needed to pull this off. The teens really did the work but still required an adult to drive, shop, supervise cooking, make sure all the food is hot at the same time and serve at mealtime. (Once every one got here the excitement level was too high to expect any further productive “work” from the kids besides I don’t mind, I munched yummy food as I played waitress and short order cook)
• Adult take over is not good. So what if the soup bowls are paper and the tablecloths don’t match. They did a lovely job and they own this party.

Dinner’s about over, they have exchanged quirky gifts and taken photos. Soon the music and DVDs will break out and the usual family room pile of fully stuffed kittens will ensue.