dinner with the donnelly's | matt & anna

we finally managed to host another dinner last weekend! this time with two new friends, matt scheffer and anna zajac. alex has known matt for almost two years, but he had never met anna (matt's fiancé) until their wedding shower in february. i met matt and anna both for the first time at their wedding shower. though i didn't know them, it was a real honor to celebrate with them. it was so nice to have them over for a meal so we could get to know them better. they leave for their wedding in about two weeks, so being able to squeeze in some time with them was really special.

we made indian butter tofu with roasted cauliflower and sweet potatoes over basmati rice. it was the first time i had cooked tofu, and it came out great! little did we know, anna loves tofu. for dessert we had vegan chocolate chip cookies and vegan baklava, which little did we know is matt’s favorite dessert! we killed it.

this was our first dinner at home with another couple. we talked about relationships, growth, and marriage (and cats, they have one as well). matt has this ability to ask important, deep, and vast questions - and he genuinely wants to know your answer, a rare quality. matt and anna really are a great example of what that world would feel like if we all showed up and were present with and listened to each other. alex and i having not known anna as well, loved her ability to be so open with two total strangers. we find really hard to open up to new people sometimes, that feeling is particularly accelerated by the internet. but we've found that letting go of your identity (artist, ego, your internet self, etc) and just being a person with other people helps. though a simple concept, it's often is difficult one in execution. they both were just an amazing breath of fresh air. we felt very grateful for four damn near strangers to have such great synergy and conversation all night.

find them on instagram:

@matt.scheffer

@anna.zajac_