Birthday Celebration.

My birthday was a success yesterday!

(Thank you for the sweet birthday wishes!)

I had some of my friends over for a little dinner party.

I tried to do a little bit of decorating.

I made some Apple Cider Sangria.  I found the recipe via Pinterest (of course!).  

But I think it definitely could have used a bit more brandy.  

It was absolutely delicious, and I will have to make it again.

On the menu for the night was an assortment of "gourmet" grilled cheese sandwiches.

Guacamole Grilled Cheese Sandwich

Caprese Grilled Cheese Sandwich

French Onion Grilled Cheese Sandwich

Sweet & Spicy Caramelized Onion & BBQ Grilled Cheese

And also a few soups to pair:

Bella Minestrone Soup

Autumn Harvest & Butternut Squash Soup

Tuscan Tomato & Basil Soup

I wish I could tell you that I made everything from scratch 

(I was planning to make the bread from scratch, but I haven't made bread in ages,

 and I didn't want to risk it).

I bought the soup from Vons.  All of them were amazing!

I wanted to try all of the sandwiches.

So, what I did was make a few of each, cut them into a few pieces, 

and we all got to have a few bits to try them all.  

Well, not really try all of them.  I only made the guacamole one and the french onion one.  

They were both so good...but we were all so full from them that we didn't have room to eat the other ones!

However, this morning my friend and I made the Caprese one and that we delightful as well!

And of course, my birthday cake!

I really had the best time.  I didn't take any photos during the party because, I mean let's get real...those 10 bottles of wine weren't going to drink themselves!

We stayed up until 3 am!  Completely on accident... 

We were playing Cards Against Humanity

It's like Apples to Apples, but for adults!

AND you can totally download it for free and print it out at home! 

We were laughing for HOURS playing the game!

At the end of the night we thought, 

"Hey, let's open another bottle of wine...Yes!  Excellent idea...oh wait, it's 3 am!"