Yeah, Lissa, I was going to ask you about that. Unfortunately , I didn't make I copy of all that before handing it off. We can work out the quantities before the shopping trip pretty late in the game.

To start, the key thing is to work out the menu. We know we need pancakes - along with syrup and butter. We also want juice, coffee and tea. The Health Department has some specific rules and restrictions around what we are supposed to prepare on site and how to keep cold things cold. That's why ready-to-drink juice is a lot easier than mixing up frozen concentrate. Besides, if you remember how fast things went last year, folks were drinking juice about as fast as the cans or jugs could be opened, let alone trying to mix up water and concentrate. For 'butter' I got sqeeze bottles of margerine and, other than overestimating how much to get, I think that worked out pretty well. All anybody had to do was grab a blue bottle, give it a squeeze and pass it on. Almost no mess, no fuss. Sticks or tubs might have been a little cheaper, but sometimes there is value in fast and easy.

In addition to the menu and grocery list, we need to take inventory of equipment. I think we still have a stack of cast iron griddles. What about the gas stoves? Do we still need fittings and lines to hook them up to propane tanks? I think we still have a bunch of kitchen and serving supplies - mixing bowls, pitchers, cups, plates, forks and knives. It would be good to know where we stand on that kind of stuff a little earlier in the game.

One think I learned last year was that I didn't do a very good job delegating. I was really grateful that so many folks stepped up and filled voids as they saw them. I will try to hand off some of these tasks a little better and earlier this time around.

more soon,

Jhim.