Pre-COVID - How often do you entertain?

What do you count as “entertaining”?

My kids had friends over 3-4 times a week.
I had friends over 1-2 times a week.

I hosted events like book club once every few months.

My dad comes over every Sunday.

The piano teacher comes over once a week.

We had some family gatherings pre-covid. I don't really have any friends to invite over, though.

Monthly, at minimum. All holidays and family birthdays were celebrated at our house. Quite honestly, I've enjoyed my year off.

I always die laughing at those shows . . . "wE neEd SpaCe tO enTErtAin"  and in my head I'm like "as if" hahahaha

Very few people "entertain" and I'll bet there's even less now that enjoy the thrill of hosting.  

I love to entertain, and do it frequently.  Just had a group of 18 the other day drinking and laughing and swapping all our books around prior to summer reading season. We have someone to dinner at least once a week, our kids and their friends still zoom in and out as we have a pool and acreage to play around on.  We host all family holiday gatherings, most baby and bridal showers, and many political fundraisers.  

Pre-covid, I'd have one or several people over once a week or at the longest, every 2 weeks. Sometimes for happy hour, sometimes for crafting and wine, sometimes for drinks before or dessert after a dinner out, sometimes just because. As to having a dinner party type of thing, maybe once every 10-12 weeks.

If it makes a difference, I live alone and LONG for activity and company in my home. I tend to be the organizer and "reacher-outer/check on youer" in my friends group. Also, my get-togethers are on the small side since I'm a condo dweller. Six is a typical size get-together at my place. I'll got to 12-14 for special occasions. NYE I go a bit bigger than that (view of the Space Needle fireworks).

Since covid began, I've only had one friend over on a semi-regular basis. And that only began months and months after the pandemic started, and only if we both quarantined for 10-14 days beforehand. We were both leading very quiet pandemic lives, and she (even pre-covid) works from home FT. I'm getting close to inviting a handful of friends over for HH again, but since most of us are most comfortable outdoors, I need to wait a bit until the weather is more predictable so we can be on the terrace.

I used to have open house once a week. My friends would come and bring a snack to share and we would knit, crochet and TALK (well perhaps a little gossip  It meant I had to keep up with the house cleaning, but I loved it. It was motivation to do so.

My guest room was perhaps used several times a year when I would invite craft friends from out of town. They would stay several nights in a row up to a week. I have a nice craft room that used to be roomier until I got too much put in it. (I need to get some of it weeded out!)

We have a nice size house, but not too much of a open house plan. The living room, dining area and kitchen are all open to each other, but not very roomy. Its all pretty cozy. But, my friends seems to enjoy coming over.

lol - very relatable. We specifically told our realtor when we were househunting last year that we did NOT want an open floor plan and I think that's why we got a good price on the house we bought - it didn't have one and most people wanted one.

As for entertaining - we had JUST started a monthly dinner with friends when Covid hit - waiting for my youngest to be fully vaccinated before we start back up especially since the friends in question aren't getting vaccinated.

We used to host big family gatherings (ILs) once a year but much of the family has died or moved away so...there's no one left to invite.

Otherwise - mostly just Baptism, FHC, and Confirmation parties and graduation parties. My youngest had Confirmation during the pandemic and it'll be a few years before she graduates (2025) so...

Guest rooms though - those I need. My DS is military and when he's able to come home, it's usually for 1-3 weeks (too long for a couch or sleeping bag, im). Older DD is moving out (and in with DS) at the end of the year - we'll turn her room into a second guest room. My sister and BIL will hopefully be visiting once it's safe to travel. And my bestie lives out of state and pre-pandemic would visit once or twice a year.

We multi-purpose the guest room (s) though. Our books are in the one we have now and when DD moves out, her room will be a guest room with shelving to display family photos and heirlooms.

I’m another who could count the number on my hands. Before we had kids, it was constant. None of our friends had their own house so we had friends over to play cards. Or they would come over after their adult softball games or after a day of golf. Now, just about never. Once we all had kids, we’re busy with kid stuff. If we all have a free weekend, we would go camping together. Out kids have no interest in having birthday parties. We probably have one friend/family gathering about once every 2 years.

When our kids were young, we’d have other families over to eat just about every weekend. We’d always volunteer to host team parties, family birthday parties and that kind of thing, so we had people coming and going all the time.

We don’t entertain as often any more at home now that our kids are grown. However, during the summer, we have friends and family stay with us at our lake house almost every weekend, so I guess we actually do a lot of entertaining.

I’m not at all surprised that the couples on international house hunters want to have a guest room. Most of those couples are pretty young and I would imagine they have parents who come visit. (I know I’d want to go visit my kids if they lived overseas). I would think also that if you lived in Rome or Paris or some other international city, your friends might not fly over just to see you, but if they were vacationing in Europe, they might very well plan a stop over to visit you.

We have friends and family over a lot. My sisters live out of state and would come to stay with us every couple months. My daughter and her boyfriend come to stay every 6 weeks or so from Georgia. We have friends over for a fire or dinner or drinks every couple weeks. So my guest bedrooms are in use constantly, and I love to cook for friends.

When I think of "entertaining" I think of a party, not just the occasional visitor. I used to have a bbq or party once or twice a year. Unfortunately that's dwindled down in recent years since most of my friends have kids and don't want to bring their kids here (there's not really anything for kids to do in my house/yard) and can't easily leave them with a sitter. So most parties now happen at their homes.

We have a pool so pretty much every weekend during summer.

Other than hosting my card group once a year, we no longer entertain at home. When we lived overseas we entertained quite a bit. Once we got back home we remodeled the house to make it more open and conducive to entertaining (it wasn't before). The first couple of years we did entertain, but we don't any longer. Part of it is that a group of expat wives I belonged to disbanded. Prior to that I was often hosting a stitch group, board meetings, card groups. The other factor was that it became very rare for anyone to reciprocate and entertain in their home. Now it's just easier to meet people at local restaurants which everyone seems to prefer that. DH has always been a loner so he has been very happy with the change.

As for overnight guests, we haven't had overnight guests for well over 10 years, since our parents all passed away.  The rest of our small family that doesn't travel (DH's sister has never been to see us in the 30 years we've owned this house!).  For our other locations, the number of guests directly correlated to where we were posted.  Paris & San Francisco produced the most house guests, with New Orleans being third.  Now when friends visit, they are typically here on business and staying in a hotel at company expense.

That's not always the case.  Not everyone can afford to travel to far flung places, much less pay for hotels.  Many of our guests in Paris were college students, a few who had never left the US before.  We were more than happy to have a spare room/bath for them so that they could expand their world views.