bad girlfriend?

Well, I can make myself look busy for a few minutes while I spill my guilty heart to the rest of you.

Cinco de Mayo weekend. Boyfriend's dad is having a birthday party for his "friend" Saturday night. His dad alone invited 75 people, and had no RSVP. So we had no clue how many would show up.

Boyfriend and I helped clean things up. Friday night, I baked a gluten-free banana cake, regretting I didn't bring enough stuff for two cakes.

Saturday, a friend showed up to help arrange things. He was an interior decorator, and I suck at asthetics. So his input on where to put things was helpful. The birthday boy showed up a couple hours before people were supposed to start coming and grilled up a lot of food that was to be served.

I've had lots of experience with my mom and dad having gatherings at their house where food will be served. So I helped in trying to get as much done as possible. Considering we made a stop at the grocery store a half hour before the first person showed up, we were running short on time.

The one thing I forgot to have ready to go were the appetizers. Stupid. So after the first 15-20 people showed up, I was in the kitchen frantically making plates, and runnning them to where people were gathering and socialzing. On the trip back to the house, I'd pick up an empty tray, and repeat.

Boyfriend kinda got stuck at the grill BBQing what wasn't already prepared. He was thoughtful enough of me to tell me "get a plate, and I'll put some food on it right now." It was also a great way to start enticing people to where the grilled foods were setup.

I was kind of the hospitality person. Since I was of the few girls there, I was trying to make sure the guys had what they needed, and refill the snack plates as needed. With the layout of the properity, it was a lot of stair climbing and walking.

After about three hours, boyfriend had enough of grilling. He manged to get a plate and eat something while grilling. And we both were running out of gas. This wasn't even our party, so we made our exit, and headed up to his place at the property next door. And we weren't bothered the rest of the night.

Walking up there, he commented: "I only got to drink one beer because I couldn't get away from the grills and nobody brought me a new one." I felt terrible: at least I manged to get some of the Mai-Tai drink whenever I was in the area it was made up in as well as some wine when I was acting as temporary barmaid.

I reverted into my "hostess" mode where I was trying to make sure everyone was fed, liquored, and having a good time. I was so busy running around that I forgot about poor boyfriend stuck in grill land.

While his dad and friend appreciated what we did in helping the food flow (and my hostessing), there were a couple things that hopefully we'll remember the next time. The first is either have all the food grilled ahead of time, or hire someone to grill the food during the party. The second is to have the appetizers ready to go when people start showing up.

Overall, lots of liquor was consumed, all the food was gone, and people said they had a great time. Somehow, I think that if possible, my boyfriend will try and be out of town for the next party his dad has.