Weekend update - Food and Games

What could be better than friends, food and games over the weekend?

Saturday
I met Shane over at A Window Between Worlds to do our karmic souls some good and we did data entry for a few hours. They had about 20 sorority sisters in there doing the regular volunteer work (painting the envelopes) and boy did I feel old! And very practical! I listened to a few just going on about their dresses and accessories for some big dance that was coming up and I thought, boy they have NOTHING to worry about in this world yet.

Then, Lincoln and Nikki came over for dinner. I made the Sunday rib roast and asparagus with parmesan cheese (both from a Barefoot Contessa book). I also tried a new buttermilk mashed potato recipe from my first Cook's Illustrated magazine (thanks Shane!!). The mashed potatoes were good as was everything else. I was hoping that everything would be excellent, but I'd have to say it was very good. I let the meat sit a little too long, but Lincoln and Nikki both said that they thought it was good, so that's all that matters.

After we ate, I introduced them to Katamari Damacy. That game is just so darn cute! I love it. They loved it too, so I was glad to spread the Katamari love. In fact, Lincoln already has the soundtrack for me! Yea!

Sunday
Shane & I went to Gary's house for a games day. It was fun. I played Time's Up, Can't Stop, Boggle, and Settlers of Catan with the 5-6 player expansion.

Time's Up - Fun as usual. This is probably one of my favorite party games.

Can't Stop - This was my first time playing and we couldn't stop! We played three games. It's quick, easy and fun. I'm already hunting down a copy on eBay. I loved it!

Boggle - OK. I had a little stint of playing Wordracer on Yahoo! games for a while a few years ago, so I can play it, but not my game of choice.

Settlers - Always fun! First time I've played with six players and it didn't slow it down as much as I though. The board is bigger and there are two extra ports. Jesse (new guy) who hadn't played Settlers before LOVED it and wanted to play again immediately, so they played a four player version. At the beginning of this games day, he listed is favorite games as Uno, Scrabble, and some other generic games. I have a feeling he will fall in love with the German games and never look back.

Overall, very fun weekend. I'm already scheduled for another games night on Wednesday! I'm really hoping to play Caylus, Vinci or Euphrat & Tigris. I'm new to this group, so we'll see. I will go with the flow...