Party Like It's COVID 19-99

I don't know about you, but having reached the one-month mark of the stay-at-home order here in North Carolina, I'm getting more than a little stir crazy. We haven't been able to go out for dinner, to a movie, or out for much of anything except walking the dog and all of our social plans have been cancelled. Sure, we have enjoyed some outdoor chats with neighbors, and we have been staying in touch with friends by phone, but it's just not the same. Mercifully, two of our friends came over Saturday for some much needed quality time. We kept a reasonable distance and made sure to be cautious about spreading germs, but having a sense of normalcy again was amazing.

Just to be on the safe side, I divided my Mexican layer dip into individual serving dishes.
Ain't nobody got time for cross contamination.

Personal size charcuterie plates, anyone?

All set up for a fun afternoon with actual other people! Company's coming!
I made sure to leave plenty of pandemic elbow room.

A pitcher of margaritas and, in the spirit of the occasion, some Corona beer.

Let's party like it's COVID 19-99.

The dogs don't do social distancing...thank goodness.
At times like these, we need all the puppies we can get.

This is Charlie with his friend Barkley. These two provided us with lots of entertainment.
Believe me when I say that a good time was had by ALL.

The weather cooperated, our dogs played their little hearts out, and we sipped and snacked and talked and laughed. It was good medicine. I feel like we are starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel, and I can't wait until afternoons like these happen more often than not. In the meantime, I recommend that you invite a few people to come over (but not too close), make up a self serve drink station and some safely plated appetizers, and party like it's COVID 19-99!

Birthday Queen: Quarantined

I freely admit; I like to make a big deal out of my birthday. I am known for parlaying the event into an entire birthday month of celebrating, in what I like to describe as my generous attempt to give my family and friends plenty of time for festivities without feeling rushed. This year was a bit different from my normal revelry, what with the coronavirus showing up as an unexpected guest, but I'm pleased to report that even confined to home, without the option of going out on the town and unable to gather with friends, I still had a pretty good birthday. I guess all this practice has made perfect?

This calls for a tiara. Then again, most occasions do.

I think those who know me best were a bit worried that all this stay-at-home-order business might put a damper on my birthday, and as a result, everyone lavished me with attention (which, if you have known me for a millisecond, you know I'm perfectly fine with). Over the course of the month so far, friends mailed gifts, cards, envelopes of confetti; I had wine delivery and cookie delivery, and a few of our neighbors even arranged a small (less than ten people as required by the President) driveway happy hour on my special day to help celebrate. Don't worry, we sipped our cocktails at six feet apart.

Just a few of the fun gifts I got this year: everything from Clemson socks, 
not one but two Golden Girls books, a kit to make your own slippers, my drug of choice t-shirt, and a beautiful pair of Tory Burch sandals (apparently, footwear is the traditional gift for this birthday, in case you noticed a pattern).

Once, after losing a pageant, I threw myself a pity party and ate an entire Boston cream pie in one day. Clint reminded me of that when he presented me with this one and said, "I knew you  must really like them after that." Ah, thanks for the memories.

Even Charlie the puppy got in on the good times.

We obviously weren't able to go out for a birthday dinner, and the idea of fancy food in a takeout container was not appealing, so I chose pizza delivery from a great brick oven pizzeria here in Charlotte. The weather was gorgeous, and we sat outside and enjoyed a pistachio pizza (it sounds weird, it tastes delicious) and a spicy salami pizza while the dog ran and played in the yard. An episode of Ozark followed, and then I was ready for my Golden Girls pajamas and a good night's sleep. The next day was Good Friday and we had Easter weekend ahead of us!

A dirty martini while waiting for birthday pizza to arrive.

I know we are supposed to avoid travel, but Easter is always a fun celebration for my family (and a continuation of birthday activities as well), so we headed to Georgia and spent the weekend with my parents. I deemed it essential. Even though we didn't leave the house, it was a much needed change of scenery--and as Clint so sweetly pointed out, "it was nice to have people to interact with besides each other." Love you, too, dear.

Of course my mom had decorations and another cake waiting for me!

More cake? More celebrating? If you insist.

Mom's Easter table--who needs to leave the house when it looks this festive?

Easter ready!

I found this adorable butter bunny at the grocery store and new he was a must-have.
He was *almost* too cute to eat.

It's not Easter without deviled eggs
(bonus points if they are served on a deviled egg tray older than you are).

In case you couldn't tell, this little guy had himself an egg-cellent Easter.

It wasn't our usual celebration, but it was a happy Easter, indeed.

I'm sure you can tell, we managed to have ourselves a fine time, even under quarantine! A little pandemic can't keep us down. I won't lie: it's been a quieter kind of celebration so far...but I have been happy to inform everyone that this is really just a warm-up. The real birthday shindigs are simply postponed until the world goes back to "normal." Until then, I'm happy to keep practicing.

And if you are one of the many who helped make me feel celebrated on my special day, thank you for the birthday love! A belle never forgets.