By some weird quirk of nature, while football fans were sloshing through the melting snow in Dallas on Super Bowl Sunday, in Houston the weather was ideal for an indoor-outdoor party allowing hosts to take advantage of summer kitchens, outdoor fireplaces and fire troughs.

No one handled the climate anomaly in finer style than Lucinda and Javier Loya, who entertained more than 100 football fan friends at their swank home in the Memorial area. They threw open the vast glass sliding doors, revved up the fireplaces both indoor and out and invited guests to make themselves at home.

The house itself is a work of art, a modern baroque masterpiece envisioned by Lucinda, whose creative interior design talents have won her a heady coterie of clients from Los Angeles to New York to Aspen. Every space, enthusiastically and richly appointed, served as a vibrant framework for fans of both the Steelers (the Loyas) and the Packers (Kara and Ray Childress).

In fact, the study served as football central where several TV screens in varying sizes carried the game. This is where the big board betting took place and where serious football fans gathered. The seating area in the summer kitchen with its large flat screen TV was another popular spot for catching the game and the ads. Sarah and Ron Simon, Meredith Cullen and Danielle White and Liz and Tom Glanville parked here for a while.

The group included a mix of business associates (Javier is Choice Energy Services CEO), social celebs and even the Loyas' home builder Tommy Dorsey and his son, Thomas Dorsey. Choice senior energy broker John Elias, who has a penchant for cooking, manned the grills insuring that there was plenty of beef tenderloin and chicken to go with the bountiful buffet spread. Bartenders at two different locations kept the libations flowing.

Taking a break from the game for a buffet run were Kara and Aaron Howes, Mindy and Jeff Hildebrand, Lisa and Michael Holthouse, Greggory and Pat Burk, Lorie Elizabeth James and Stephanie and Bill Perkins.

The best seat in the house was actually outside of the house in the garden where the game was projected, in surprisingly good definition, on a second floor wall. As the night chilled, a few guests grabbed the seats at the foot of the swimming pool where a blazing fire trough provided warmth for game viewing. Kimberly and Frank DeLape, Sofia Adrogué and Sten Gustafson and even Lucinda found it a cozy perch as the night air chilled.

Operatic farewell

Not everyone was thinking Super Bowl on Sunday afternoon, particularly not famed mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade. Her final performance in Houston Grand Opera's Dead Man Walking earlier in the day marked the end of a long and illustrious operatic stage career. It was no small honor for HGO to host von Stade as she concluded 40 years of performances in the world's great opera houses.

At the end of her performance in Wortham Theater Center, HGO presented von Stade with the first Silver Rose Award, an honor to be given only rarely and solely to commemorate long associations and artistic achievement.

In celebration of von Stade's great talent, her long-time friends Jackson Hicks and Milton Townsend opened their historic Montrose area home following the Sunday matinee for a "Farewell to Flicka" cocktail reception.

The champagne flowed and, as one guest commented, "Of course, the food was out of this world."

Following brief remarks by HGO general director Anthony Freud and HGO board president Glen Rosenbaum, the stars took over. Dead Man Walking composer Jake Heggie and mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato had written two songs in von Stade's honor and handed out lyrics to the 60-plus guests for all to sing a fun and fond farewell to "Flicka."

Joining the musical rounds were John Turner and Jerry Fischer, Rudy Avelar, Gloria Portela and Dick Evans, Jim Crownover, Guyla Pirher, Greg Robertson, Phoebe and Bobby Tudor, Will McLendon, David Chambers and the cast of Dead Man Walking.