Girls’ Night Out -Friday, April 20, 2012
My wonderful sister emailed me a
couple of weeks ago and asked if I would be interested in attending Girls’
Night Out at the Windmill Gardens in Sumner this year. Heck yes!
I always love this event. It’s a
night of food, shopping, cocktails and men in tuxedoes. Who wouldn’t like that?
The first thing you do is line up
so you can be escorted in by a handsome gentleman in a tuxedo; if the day is
sunny they add sunglasses so they look extra cool! You are given your wineglass for the evening
and your goodie bag from an event sponsor.
And, you sign up for the drawings.
There were a lot of changes from
previous years. There were fewer vendors
this year; I would estimate only about 1/3 of what has been there in the
past. Mamma Stortini’s was replaced by
three new food vendors. The tent that
used to house an amazing antipasto display and tables for seating now only had
a small handful of reserved and disabled tables and silent auction items.
Instead of getting two glasses of
wine, you now got four tickets and it was for wine” tasting”. And, I noticed some of the vendors were not
so generous with their “samples”. I’m
not a big drinker. And, I really didn’t
want to spend my evening standing in line waiting to “sample” wine. You have to understand that this is a pretty
crowded event so there are usually lines for wine most of the night.
I spoke to one very nice lady who
noted that almost all the food had seafood of some sort, so she was not able to
eat anything but the crackers and cheese served at each wine vendor. She was not such a happy camper. Also, there were some really nice looking
cheeses displayed at the wine vendors, but no one was serving and nothing was
labeled. It would have been nice to know
what they were and how they would have paired with which wines. And, which were dairy cheeses and which might
have been non-dairy cheese in case of any food allergy.
One vendor served a nice salmon
on crackers. Sigh. Every wine vendor
serving “samples” was also serving cheese and crackers. As good as it was, little more variety would
have been welcome here.
Where were the rich chicken and
beef satay skewers? Where was the savory
garlic shrimp? There was the warm creamy
pasta that was served in previous years?
One vendor served a Thai chicken and rice dish that was so runny I
wasn’t sure if it was supposed to be a sample entrée or a soup. It was very tasty in spite of the off putting
appearance. But, the serving was very
small. There was a warm pasta dish when
you first came in.
Warm pasta
This year there was the salmon
and crackers and there was a cold sprout and rice wrap with a peanut sauce that
was tasty, the warm pasta and the Thai chicken and rice soup/dish. I think with so few vendors, it might have
been nice to have a theme to the food that was universal that more people could
eat. Maybe the theme was seafood?
In past years you could come and
count on having dinner. Not so much,
this year.
sprout and rice wraps
On the PLUS side I got a lovely
hyacinth for $10 drawing fee that had a giveaway for an additional plant so I
have two new plants for my yard. That is
one tradition that did not change that I like!
I was offered the choice of a plant, potting soil or something
else. I always get such a kick out of
this tradition every year. Umm, yes I’ll
just tuck that 10 lb. bag of potting soil into my clutch, thank you very much!
LOL Actually, the nursery is very gracious about setting aside all the plants and
items that you win and purchase for later pick up.
I found two new gems within the
plethora of standard vendor fair.
I met the gal from Madyson’s
Marshmallows she makes them from scratch here in Bonney Lake and they are
amazing! You can get them online at http://madysonsmarshmallows.com/
or at the tea shop at Windmill Gardens. She has “Melts” for your hot beverage,
caramel dipped marshmallows and S’mores.
Another local vendor I fell in
love with was Wet Noses. She sells
home-made organic pet treats. We went
for the Peanut Butter and Dogranola.
Thurston and Gilligan give them both two paws up! Lance and Jazz sell them at shows and online
at http://wet-noses.com/
Otherwise, the usual suspects
were present: Mary Kay represented in
their lovely pink booth. I love their
cleansers and moisturizers. (Did I mention I am a consultant?)
Scentzy was there with some
really neat new warmers. Herbalife, Miche bag and the new Jewelkade also
represented. I don’t remember noticing
any of the other vendors. There were a
few local ones and probably a few more “national” brands. Nothing else really caught my attention.
Sis bought some lovely items from POSH.
We stopped by the tea shop to buy
some of Madyson’s marshmallows, but I got scolded for taking photos inside the
shop, so that kind of put a damper on the mood.
I doubt I’ll be buying tea there anytime soon.
Next, I decided to try the martini
from the drink luge. Considering I would
estimate the the average age of the “target” patron” for this event to be 35-45
the white thong panties advertising Pinnacle Vodka seemed a bit much. The luge dropped straight down. Sis and I joked that it must have been the
most inexpensive one designed by the D+ engineering student. The martini was too sweet and not cold, since
it never touched any ice on its plunge straight down the “drain”. I believe the martini was Cointreau, Whipped
Vanilla Vodka and something in a brown bottle.
I would have preferred a Kamikaze.
Um, sorry no pics of the thong panties since there were no sparkles or feathers. They were just plain white with black advertising on them. LOL
On our tour of the lovely gardens,
in our quest for food, we noticed that there was no dessert station this
year. We were told that each food
station would be putting out dessert after 8pm.
Bummer, we’ve seen the few vendors there were to see, we’ve had the
food, I got scolded in the tea shop, and
I tried the drink luge. Now we have to
wait another ½ hour for dessert? Nah!
We drive over to my favorite HG
Bistro and got the Lemon and Carrot cakes and took them back to my place and
watch the rest of last week’s Fashion Star and chatted. The cakes were fabulous! HG Bistro was packed to the gills, which
makes me happy to see that business is good for them!
Overall I had a great night with
my sister. We need to do more together!
I’m glad that I went out to
support Good Samaritan Hospital.
I‘m all for positive changes, but
maybe too much change at once isn’t necessarily a good thing when you have an
established brand. I would have loved to
see them mix up the food a bit, but I still expected the same quality for my
money. The food
this year was only so so, nothing I’d go out of my way for, or recommend. We never did stand in line for wine. We gave away our drink tickets before we
left.
Maybe they are targeting a
younger crowd now?
If cost was an issue I would have
willingly paid a little more for my ticket to have better food and wine.
Not enough seating is an issue
every year. This year there seemed to be
even less.
One of the things I liked about
the big tent with the big tables was the opportunity to meet other people. The tiny groups of tables made it harder to
find open seating and discouraged meeting new people as the seating was too
“intimate”.
If next year is more of the same,
I wouldn’t go again.
There are other charities I’d
enjoy supporting more.
