Dinner Party Deluge!

My friend Don, who is one of my two best friends from college (not to mention life in general!), is coming into town tonight. He just successfully defended his thesis for his Ph.D. in linguistics (with highest honors, I might add!) and we're going to celebrate! Instead of getting everyone together at a restaurant, I thought I'd have a small dinner party. Here is how I set the table:

I used this really pretty Japanese paper (leftover from the bellybands for my best friend's wedding invitations . . you can see that in an earlier post) as placemats. I saw that idea in a magazine recently (Martha?) and loved it. The lighting in my livingroom isn't that great, so the photo doesn't really show the color. Here is a closeup:

I'm just (shhhh. . . ) going to do the same menu that I did for Erica's shower last week, since I love the recipes and they are easy to do for company, because you can do almost all of the prep in advance. I don't like being stuck in the kitchen while everyone else is having fun! The only thing I am changing is . . . no bacon (so sad!) because Don doesn't eat red meat. We will, however, be having some celebratory bubbly!