Eating with the Lion

So we had a great Shabbos meal this week. We were really excited for a lot of reasons. First some of our favorite guests were coming (my favorite twins), and Lion of Zion & his family! Now Mrs. LFD and Lion grew up together in the same community, and their parents are friends, so it was really nice. We also for the first time in a while had a new guest, a friend of Jacob Da Jew, who I found out davens with my brother in law. Mrs. LFD's brother and Lion have kids in the same school and grade, so all in all we had 9 plus us in our little 2 bedroom apartment. We ate and talked until 4 in the afternoon, and the kids didn't "melt down" until 4, so we had some nice "grown-up" conversation at the table. We covered everything from the Flatbush eruv to solving the problems in Israel. One of the topics was having tzedakah collectors come into your simcha. By our wedding, we set up a table for them slightly outside the main hall, and gave $ to the maitre'd to give to collectors. We didn't want our guests hounded. Mrs. LFD made a salt and pepper kugel, one of my favorites, and a carrot kugel that even my fussy kids both ate. We had great chulent and kugel, and Mrs. LFD got to make one of her pastrami-flower topped deli platters. We were all together from different walks of life, enjoying each others company and ideas. Now that's a great Shabbos!