Plaque

No, I'm not talking about the kind on your teeth.  That would be a strange subject, indeed.  I'm talking about the one Anthony received tonight.

That's right, Anthony received an award.  He was able to sell enough policies to be invited to an Awards Night for Farm Bureau downtown. 

The funny thing is, he didn't even know that he was invited to this dinner until Wednesday.  It wasn't until someone mentioned that they needed his RSVP... whoops! 

Let me tell you, it was far beyond our level of posh-ness.  I know it's not a word, just go with it.  We are not the least bit fancy.  Our idea of manners at our house is pointing out that you are going to be reaching over someone's plate before actually doing it. 

And our idea of dressing up is Sunday clothes.  Fortunately, Anthony has a suit but I don't own any fancy clothing.  I don't own much clothing period.  The skirt and shirt that I wear to church every.stinking.Sunday (someday I'll have new duds) are just plain boring.  They are old, worn out and quite frankly, I just don't like them. 

So I opted for my only pair of pants that aren't jeans (I have 3 pairs of jeans.... not much) and a shirt and sweater that I acquired from my grandma after her passing.  Is that sad?  I'm wearing Grandma's clothes but she was very stylish, I promise.  No one would know they were Grandma's, except that you do now. 

And that is how we went.  Did we blend in?  We may have looked the part, kind of.  We tried. 

Now for the fun part, the food!  Isn't that always the best part of any event?  It is for me.  Before dinner was served, there was a cheese and cracker tray that we could eat off of.  I've had crackers before, who hasn't?  And I've had cheese before.  Never had wine before but that's beside the point.  I just thought of that because I've heard of wine and cheese tasting parties.  This was like that, minus the wine. 

I stood in the cheese and cracker line and gathered my crackers, avoiding the white ones (they had multi-grain and wheat :)) and as I looked up to the cheeses, I realized that I only recognized two of them.  As I mentioned before, I've had cheeses before.... cheddar, mozzarella, swiss, string, cottage, cream, ricotta, .... the basics.  But they had some fancy cheeses!  So, I grabbed them all.  How was I supposed to know which ones are good?  You'd have done the same, I'm sure. 

It's too bad I don't know what I was eating because they were all really good.  Couldn't they have put little signs up?  Anyway, I'm pretty sure I ate too much and that was before the salad and dinner were served. 

So then comes the salad.  Oh man!  It was heavenly.  Spinach with mandarin oranges, pecans (they were candied and we ate them anyway), feta (another cheese I know well), and this delicious PINK poppy seed dressing.  OH!  And a strawberry.  I'm pretty sure the dressing was heavily sugared, and yes, we ate it anyway.  We didn't want to be rude!  ;)

Along with our salad came the rolls.  We chose the wheat ones, and then we smeared them with butter because what else do you do with a dinner roll? 

Then they had the nerve to serve us strawberry lemonade.  I was doing just fine with my water and they killed it!  I tried so hard to avoid the lemonade but my tastebuds won. 

The actual dinner was pretty clean.  Not much to talk about there.  Two small red potatoes, steamed veggies, and a meat trio.  Mmmm! 

Dessert, I avoided it like the plague..... until they set it in front of me.  It was a chocolate mousse pie thing and it was soooo rich!  But it was chocolate and I've been craving chocolate.  I ate about 3/4 of it, Anthony finished about 1/3 of his (his will power is much stronger than mine).  I would have finished the whole thing but it was really really rich. 

Again, we didn't want to be rude.  So, of course we cheated.  But I still say we're doing well with our diets eating plan.  It's still new to us so we're still struggling. 

The awards part of the night came after all the food was cleared from the tables.  It was fun to see Anthony being awarded for something that he worked so hard for.  He felt accomplished and I think it lit a new fire in him.  He's excited about doing even better this year. 

Maybe next year he'll earn even more awards.  There were some agents there that had a TON!  It was really a fun event.  Not only that but it was nice to just get away with him and go on an actual date.  No kids (they were at my cousins... Thanks Kara!) yelling in the background or pulling each others hair or, heaven forbid, breathing each others air. 

I'm so proud of Anthony and all of his hard work!