Progressive Dinner

Last night my church held the annual progressive dinner. For those of you who do not know what a progressive dinner is it's like a drive thru, but not really. The event consists of each course of a meal (appitizers, main dish, dessert) prepared and eaten at the residence of a different host. In this case we went the Lutheran way and made it pot luck where each family brought a dish for one of the courses.

The evening began at -18˚F (warmer than years past progressive dinners I'm told) and we started at Kathy's home with appetizers. Some of the dishes included my Grandma Pfeil's famous macaroni salad (made by yours truly), a scrumpshious tossed salad with mandarin oranges as a special vinaigrette sauce (my favorite), a Salmon ball with crackers to dip, smoked salmon, shrimp, nachos, and a veggie platter.

The ladies enjoying their appetizers 

Yummy appetizers

 I really enjoyed this course mostly because there was such a variety of "Alaskan seafood". It was yummy, but I had to remind myself that there would be two more stops to go. After an hour of great conversation we headed out to the next place. The Jarnagin's. I was excited to go to their place as I had heard rumor of their spectacular view. Knowing that it was a steeper drive several of us carpooled.

Off to the next home

We arrived at the "J Ranch" to an aroma of warm ham and turkey hanging in the air. As we arrived I noted that some additional people were present. Some of the congregation members who had opted to bring the "main dish" had skipped the appetizer home to ensure the freshness of their food.

Living room crew 

I got all the men to smile!! :)

The menu this time was cheese and reindeer sausage soup (my favorite at this stop), ham, turkey, cabbage casserole, and homemade rolls. We spent a great hour and a half conversing about many things. I got the low-down on traveling to Doha, Qatar and the currency exchange of a Riyal to the US Dollar. I also learned all about traveling to Paris and tidbits from my host families recent trip to Tanzania and their successful hike up Mt. Kilimanjaro. It was very educational to me.

Main Dish!

 For are final stop we headed down the mountain to Vern & Ingrid's house for dessert. I was most looking forward to this one as Sally made her award winning caramel apple crunch. It was simply delightful. Other yummy desserts were HOMEMADE ice cream, pumpkin pie, rhubarb crunch, and chocolate brownies. It was all very good.

Dessert fellowship=the best

It was a very fun, very filling evening. Filling because I was able to converse with people for a longer, and more in-depth amount of time. I really love the people at this congregation, they really are like family. I am so blessed to have been placed here for my internship and I now see that God was preparing me for this very place all along. Why do we doubt? Why do we not heed the words of our Lord when He says "For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."?(Jeremiah 29:11). God plan is perfect, and that's better than anything I can ever forecast.