Sometimes you plan a party for weeks, and sometimes you have only a few hours.  My hubby wanted to invite some navy students over to our house while they where here training, and I only found out it was a sure thing last night!  We spent last cleaning the house because it was a DISASTER.  Really…it was!  This was a super low key get-together, so even if I hadn’t done anything, it would have been fine. But being the crazy person that I am, I made s’mores brownies, two side dishes and two appetizers. After work, I ran to the grocery store and then had about an hour to prep before our 15 guests started arriving. In an hour, I had everything finished or in the oven, and I was dressed and ready to go!  How did I do it?  Here are my tips:

1. If you’re having people over on a weeknight, and you work, have your house ready to go before you leave for work in the morning.  That way, when you get home, you can focus on food prep.

2. If there is a shortcut you can make in a recipe take it! I made s’mores brownies…so I just made box brownies and sprinkled them with crumbled up hershey bar, graham crackers, and marshmallows.  Making these from scratch would have been much too labor intensive for this evening!

3. Pick a few small touches to focus on.  I bought flowers and put them in a vase, I put forks and napkins in a nice basket next to the plates, and we had a fire going in the fireplace.  Even those things each took only a few minutes to do, they packed a big punch, and your guests will notice!