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I met my friend in the grocery shop after church on Sunday – we were both doing a quick shop on our way home from our different church services.  I was buying food for some lunch guests that I had invited home – an impromptu invite.  She commented that she never did that, though she would like to and that she noticed that I did it all the time.  Our conversation reminded me of how I got myself into that habit.

• I would menu plan to have people over.  I would have one section on my menu plan where I would note a meal that I could serve should we invite guests (this then converted to my shopping list so I had the food on hand.)
• I would have meat in the freezer so if Pete invited someone for dinner (evening meal) then I could quickly defrost something.  Sometimes I would have a frozen meal ready to defrost that would serve more than just our family.
• I would plan a nice Sunday lunch, something that could be prepared either Saturday (like a quiche or soup) or plan something that could be quickly thrown together (like a cheese platter and veggie sticks, or toasted sandwiches) and if we didn’t have folk over we would eat it for lunch and dinner ourselves.

There has always been an understanding, a trust between Peter and myself, that if the other invited someone home for a meal, then it would be okay.  Peter knows that I’ll rise to the occasion and I know that he will if I issue an invite.  Part of being able to do this, as the cook, is to be prepared – mentally and physically, knowing that you can handle the food side of the invitation.