Guess I'd better get started..

Wow! I can't believe that I have actual comments! I guess that means I had better write more posts for people to comment about.

Today my husband and I drove to nearest-big-city to check out and make a deposit on the meeting room he is renting for the esoteric-computer-stuff class he teaches. This is a big step of faith, because always before (for the last 17 years!) when he has taught these classes it has been under contract to someone else; they provided the place, the students, and the amenities. But the folk who did that have mostly moved on to other things, so if there are going to BE classes, my sole-proprietor husband will have to offer them: with money up front and no guaranteed takers. Scary enough for him.

But then there's the other part -- the amenities. ( In this case that means food and drink. ;-)) The cost of in-house catering drove him away from one possible site -- coffee at $26 per gallon, a dozen bagels the same. And NO offsite food permitted. So we moved on to another site, which doesn't care how you cater.

Which is very good, because the caterer of choice is -- ME. This is not entirely outside my scope; I have a food-service background (I helped open a small deli-type restaurant) and actually catered our second daughter's wedding reception. (Full disclosure -- it wasn't the same day as the wedding; she got married in a far-Western state and had one reception there, and then we had a local reception for people in this area.) But I've never been solely in charge of the food for a four-day schedule of classes all on my own.

Fortunately the numbers shouldn't be too high. A class of 25 students would be pushing our wildest-dreams limit, especially till we get husband-offering-classes down to a part of the local business routine. And when our whole family is home, I'm regularly cooking for 10 or more. But this is not in my own kitchen (it's about an hour drive away; refigerator, sink, and dishwasher, but no stove.) And I want to plan for a minimum of leftovers. So, while I have lots of ideas, and a rudimentary guess at needs and costs, I guess I'd better get started! Good thing the class isn't until the second week in October. I'll keep you posted.