Build-Your-Own Pizza Party

Pizza party time!

It was my turn to host the girls for our book club discussion this month, so I invited them over for a make-your-own pizza party. I bought the dough, sauce, and cheese, and invited everyone to bring their favorite toppings to share.

Stephanie was sweet enough to bring beer. She knew Cigar City Maduro was my favorite from reading the blog. Love her.

We drank beer and each prepped our own personal pizzas.

It was fun seeing everyone’s different tastes shine though.

I went the sweet and savory route with mine. The base was a pesto basil sauce layered with thin slices of peach, goat cheese, walnuts, and fresh basil.

Out of the oven, I added a handful of arugula and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar.

The pizza was amazing. Loved the addition of the peaches, next time I would add a touch of honey as well. Yum.

We all gathered around the table and got down to book discussion time.

This month’s book was Blueprints for Building Better Girls by Eliss Schappell.

Blueprints for Building Better Girls delves into the lives of an eclectic cast of archetypal female characters—from the high school slut to the good girl, the struggling artist to the college party girl, the wife who yearns for a child to the reluctant mother—mapping America’s shifting cultural landscape from the late 1970s to the present day. Its interconnected stories explore the commonly shared but rarely spoken of experiences that build girls into women and women into wives and mothers. In revealing all their vulnerabilities and twisting our preconceived notions of who they are, Elissa Schappell alters how we think about the nature of female identity and how it evolves.

I really, really wanted to like this book (in fact, I was the one who suggested it), but I just could not get into it, and neither could the rest of the girls. The book is a collection of 8 short stories, where each story focuses on women in various stages of life. All of the characters and circumstances are loosely linked, but for the majority, each story is separate from the next.

I really enjoyed a couple of the stories, but couldn’t get into the rest. They were a little drawn out and, as I finished one story, I didn’t feel the pull to start the next.

However, Courtney did bring up some interesting points when we discussed the narrative behind each story, and asked how we see our own narratives being written. I know my narrative when I was 17 would be a whole lot different than at 27. And I could see various defining moments in my life standing out over the rest. I wonder how a collection of short stories from the defining moments of our lives would read?

After we finished our book discussion, we flipped on the Olympics to cheer the USA Gymnastics team to…. (I won’t give it away. )

Klondike Bars were handed out for dessert.

We also watched some pretty awesome things happen in the pool. We should have been having Olympic viewing parties since day 1!

Alright, time for bed.

Good Night!