Back to School Dinner Party 2014

Last night we had our Back to School Dinner Party. This year I finally had a chance to make alphabet soup. I originally got the idea here. I used the chicken noodle soup from the BH&G cookbook as a guide. I substituted fresh carrots, zucchini, and cherry tomatoes for frozen and canned. I also added WAY too much pasta. I have never used alphabet pasta before so I wasn't sure how much they would puff up. They puff up! I should have only used half a bag. As a result I added another 32oz box of chicken stock. Even with that little snafu, it was very tasty and I would certainly make it again.


I also finally had a chance to make the twinkie school buses for dessert. It took a while to get the right proportions of powdered sugar and cream to make the icing thick enough to not run, but after that they were very simple to assemble. I also put the stop sign on the wrong side of the bus I think. This was the first twinkie either of the boys had ever had. It took me right back to memories of Hot Dog lunch after a Jog-A-Thon!


I used my kindergarten lunch box to decorate the table along with some antique Hull's Complete Arithmetic text books c. 1895. I wasn't expecting the apples to be more than decorative, but each of the boys decided they needed to have an apple with dinner too.




To get the boys in the mood for school I read aloud from Little Wolf Goes to School by Mary Packard, The Bear Who Shared by Catherine Rayner, and The Day the Crayons Quit by Drew Daywalt which is a family favorite.

Today is Jr.'s first day of 1st grade and next week Deuce starts Preschool three mornings a week. I can't believe how much my sons are growing up! I'm excited to see how proficient at reading Jr becomes this year as well as all the other things he learns. And I hope that Deuce has lots of Big Boy fun. he will continue to meet with his speech pathologist, but now it will be in a school setting.