How-to Guide/Entertaining — How to Entertain Family and Friends, While Social Distancing

After staying far away from my extended family when the virus first hit, we’re now trying to see them every weekend. The oldies are lonely. These days, the only way to socialize is outside.

Our yard is weirdly shaped. We have a very skinny backyard with a more generous space on the sides of the house. With the need to give everyone lots of elbow room, we’ve relocated our parties to the side of the house. There’s no patio out there, just a nice field of grass. We keep a large stash of cloth folding chairs out there in a waterproof storage bin; Ian is usually the guy to set up chairs.

Tangent: The first time that Ian set up the chairs for a party, he put them in a straight line and equally separated. I asked him if thought that his chair configuration was good for a party. He said yes. We had to explain to him that people like to talk to each other, so chairs are usually arranged in a circle. Autistic people need all the social rules explained. Tangent over.

Some family members brought their own tables and chairs for extra coronavirus points.

For out last get together, we kept things simple with burgers and hot dogs on the grill. I made a farro salad and garden salad. My mom made a yummy pesto salad, and my bro was on potato salad duty.

Because people couldn’t help me shlep food back and forth into the kitchen or help load the dishwasher, I went with paper plates and super light melamine serving dishes.

To celebrate June’s birthdays, we picked up an ice-cream cake from my buddy who owns the local homemade ice-cream joint (guess who runs her Instagram page?).

I’m in a Goop/Martha Stewart/Reese Witherspoon kinda mood this week, so expect more pictures of home, food, and parties, until we leave for North Carolina on Saturday.