Birthday beach trip and April's dinner party

For the last three years, we've done a weekend family beach trip every April for my Dad's birthday. My parents always rent a gorgeous beach house and we three girls provide the bulk of meals. A pretty decent trade, if you ask me! Last year, Grandma & Grandpa and KC started tagging along; so when this year's trip rolled around, I was excited to combine family time with my Mission Possible dinner project.

April's dinner was a bit of a cheat, only because it was a recipe I had already played with. KC and I had decided on homemade pizzas, one of which would be a variation of the Pioneer Woman's BBQ chicken pizza. And as I had never made that many pizzas from scratch simultaneously, I figured it would be a feat worthy of Mission Possible.

But more about that later. Onto some beach photos!

Mom and Dad rented a house in a private community called Bella Beach, between Lincoln City and Depoe Bay. We went down together on Saturday afternoon and were surprised to find that the ocean was foamy! The tide left behind huge piles of suds all along the beach.




This was the house we stayed in. The kitchen had a long, wide granite counter tops, which was awesome for meal prep.




Mom, Dad, and the grandparents


KC enjoying the basement's pool table




On Sunday, KC and I took a quick trip to Rogue Nation's world headquarters and enjoyed a pint. I tried a chocolate porter or a "big girl beer" (ie: not as light and fruity as the beers I usually gravitate toward) as we termed it.




Posing outside


The Brotts dropped by for a couple hours that afternoon to celebrate Dad's birthday. Jana, KC, and I went for a walk on the beach, where a sneaker wave soon completely soaked me from the shins down.








Getting started...

Now, because we were feeding nine people (two of which who are very picky eaters), we made three different pizzas: a veggie and cheese, a sausage and olive, and a BBQ chicken. I used the same pizza dough recipe that I blogged about a few entries ago, except this time I really let it rise for extra-thick "artisan" crust.


Our unbaked, mile-high veggie pizza


Assembling the sausage pizza


The finished product-- yum-o!




The BBQ chicken: one half picky, one half not.


The pizzas were all a hit and made for excellent leftovers!


Happy family shot


Dad and his birthday gifts. Kind of looks like a senior picture pose, doesn't it?

Good food, good people. What more could you want out of life? ;)