The Breakfast

I have so much blogging to do and so little time!!  Instead of trying to keep things in chronological order, I'm just going to start posting and although things will be a bit out of order, hopefully I will be able to do all the excitement in our lives justice here on the blog.  I'm starting with a huge fundraising event at work.  When we returned from our European Adventure, I realized that nothing had really been done in my 3 month absence at work to get things ready for the upcoming fundraiser.  Another staff member, a board member and myself basically pulled the entire thing together in about 9 days.
We had a few last minute successes and fiascos.  Literally, just a few days before the event we had a vendor step up and donate all of the place settings, napkins, and linens.  This would have cost close to $1500.  It was such a relief... until we went to pick the things up the less than 12 hours before the event and they tell us that because this kind of donation is unprecedented that they couldn't give us our requested "all white" assortment but instead they had to give us all of their old stuff.  This meant black table linens, black and white plates, and red napkins.  Hmmmm, the donation didn't sound so good now, but we made the most of it (ditching the red napkins) and the table setting actually turned out really nice.  Free is always really nice.  The centerpieces ended up being all of our collective mason jars and the sugar packet holders were all of our smaller canning jars.  Same with serving spoons. It is amazing what you get when you pool the goods from just a few houses.
Another big success was having the event at our friends, James B. and Renee's Church/Coffee Shop/Event Venue.  The venue triples as all three and does a fabulous job in all three areas.  http://www.unionchurchseattle.org/,  http://kakaoseattle.com/, http://www.415westlake.com/  They are really good friends of ours as well as the couple who married us.  They couldn't have been more helpful for supportive.
Marty, who is on the OSL board was roped in to be the MC and did a fantastic job.

 The food was really yummy.  Fresh fruit and mascarpone crepes, Mini Three Cheese Breakfast Quiche,
Chocolate Crunch Banana Muffins, Irish Potato & Egg Casserole, Fresh Fruit Tarts, Fresh Cut Fruit and
Lemon Scones.  All prepared by the OSL staff.

Although it was an exhausting 9 or so days (especially directly on the heels of our trip and recovering from jet lag) it was all worth it in the end... even the all-nighter the night before... which is saying a lot coming from me.  We had about 180 people in attendance and we were able to raise nearly $30,000 dollars to help the hungry in our community.
Here is a video that was part of the event program.  http://vimeo.com/40624506
It was shot and produced  by a friend of ours, Jesse Michener.  She also took amazing  family photos last spring.
Coming up (in no particular order) Benjamin's Birthday, Franziska's Arrival, Josie riding her bike without training wheels, a trip to the Tulip Festival... and of course our Europe trip.