ringing in the new year with kate & nick.

forgive the grainy pictures. i have my camera now and below are the few shots i captured of the evening.

the new year's ball after the countdown. happy new year!

new year's kiss to ring in the year right ... it's supposed to bring good luck, you know. travis and i smooched as well, but as i was the picture-taker, no evidence exists.

travis and me just moments into 2011

the sweet men in kate and my lives

the girls

the pictures below capture part of our fabulous spread. i didn't get any pictures of our signature drink or our desserts {all of which i made for the night}, but you can still see we had no shortage of delicious treats for the evening.

kate & nick did a fabulous job whipping up philly cheese steaks, chicken quesadillas with peppers and onion, ceviche, cheese trays with fruit and honey, crostini ... the list goes on.

i served paloma coolers, a traditional tres leches cake, and molten lava chocolate cakes.

we spent the evening at the hoback evins household preparing food, watching football, playing comedy movie scene it {the guys won the first round, the girls won the second} and then we moved along to the game dirty minds ... which was a disaster really ... and landed mine and nick's minds in the gutter for the rest of the night, with kate continually asking nick "who are you?"

we quit the games to watch the countdown, share our kisses, and pop two bottles of champagne outside. all in all the night was a perfect, laid-back, success. i couldn't think of a better way to ring in the new year -- surrounded by some of our closest friends, with great food, great drinks, and lots of laughs.