Print Blog
Email a FriendI do the same thing. I just cook something I know the family likes and that I am pretty sure our visitor will like.
Visitors have always been a great motivator to me to get things clean.
Therese
Dinner Company
the work of entertaining
Posted by Rachel Balducci in Family on Wednesday, June 24, 2009 10:14 PM
Tonight we had our parish priest over for dinner. It was a really wonderful time.
I’m one of those types of people who uses entertaining as an excuse to clean everything in sight. I work like crazy to clean all the nooks and crannies, knowing full well that the dinner company will almost certainly not see the inside of my closet and or bathroom cabinet. No, I’m kidding. I don’t clean *those* areas of the house (mostly).
I’m sorry if this sounds obnoxious to you, if you are reading this and rolling your eyes at me. But here’s the trade-off: when entertaining, I tend to approach the food aspect with ardent simplicity. The times I’ve tried to shoot the moon with my cooking, I have wound up frazzled and terribly discouraged. So I have learned that what works best for me is a hearty but fool-proof meal (like barbeque in the crock-pot) and a tidy home to welcome in the guests.
The beautiful thing about having company for dinner is that when the guests leave, there is such a sense of satisfaction. The food was good; the fellowship was good; and my house is in really good shape.
If it can stay like this until mid-morning tomorrow, I will consider myself victorious.
Comments
Page 1 of 1 pages
Posted by Rebecca Teti on Thursday, Jun 25, 2009 7:42 AM (EDT):
I’m with you, Rachel. I like the “deadline” aspect of cleaning for company’s sake; it takes away the temptation to procrastinate and I love the results. In the same vein, I have a girlfriend who’s a military wife and has moved 20 times in 30 years. She & her husband actually plan a party within a few weeks of each move not only to meet their new neighbors, but to compel themselves to get their house in order and not live out of boxes for months and months. Hard work, but worth it to live in a way worthy of a human being more quickly.
Posted by Branwen on Thursday, Jun 25, 2009 7:58 AM (EDT):
We had house guests two weekends ago and I was just telling my husband the same thing. Sometimes it is good to have a reason/excuse/motivator to deep clean the house, with the added benefit the it usually is just about as clean after the guests leave.
Posted by dirty bird on Thursday, Jun 25, 2009 9:35 AM (EDT):
I am a terrible house cleaner, but a pretty good cook so when we entertain it is almost the exact opposite. My husband likes to cook, too, so we usually have a fairly elaborate spread of food, but if someone were to look in our closest (or even look in our guestroom/catch all space) it would be ugly.
I’d love to know what you clean-types would think in this situation. My house isn’t trashed by any means when we have company, but it is also far from sparkling. Can the good food make up for the grass clippings on the hallway floor?
Posted by Rebecca Teti on Thursday, Jun 25, 2009 10:35 AM (EDT):
I can’t bring myself to call you “dirty,” Ms. Bird! I’m not fussy about other people’s houses, I just enjoy the spic ‘n’ span of my own when I can achieve it. By temperament, clutter puts me on edge, so I’m never happier at home than the day leading up to and after a party. Your “fear,” though, reminds me of the wisdom of one of my mom’s friends. She used to say, “If you come to see the house, give me 2 weeks notice. If you come to see me, drop in any time.”
Posted by Rachel Balducci on Thursday, Jun 25, 2009 10:48 AM (EDT):
I think good food can indeed make up for a “messy” house. And let’s face it, this definition varies from person to person. Like Rebecca, the cleaning is for my own satisfaction. It’s like an excuse to spend the day working on the house.
I have gone to many meals where the effort was put on the food details more than the clean factor and had a wonderful time. It’s really about spending time with the guests anyway, whatever you may put your efforts into.
Posted by Danielle M. on Thursday, Jun 25, 2009 9:45 PM (EDT):
This topic makes me laugh (mostly at myself). For a couple of years, before our parish had a Church and parish hall, our Mom’s Faith Formation group met in our house twice a month. When my husband would come home from work on the evening before a meeting, he would notice the sparkling kitchen floor, cleared counters and cleaned up public spaces and know the “moms were coming” the next day. The week the parish hall opened and I told him the group would be moving to that public space, he wondered out loud (and paid a little for it:) ) if our kitchen floor would ever be mopped again. Now our house is on the market and everything has to be perfect all the time. I used to think I would be happier in a clutter free, clean house, but now I know I like the lived in feeling of a little stuff around, and when (after?) the house sells, I probably won’t recreate the totally clean, all the time feeling that we are living in now (and my 4 children certainly won’t miss it either)!
Post a Comment
By submitting this form, you give Faith And Family Magazine permission to publish this comment. Comments will be published at our discretion, and may be edited for clarity and length. For best formatting, please limit your response to one paragraph and don't hit "enter" to force line breaks.
