Via followed every instruction, although she remained quiet and she didn't say a word. She just enjoyed the meal, and tried to keep track on what the teacher was saying.

Sapphire was a little confused about the lesson as she thought they would be learning devensive spells not learning how to eat soup

KAi looked over to the person sitting beside her, she turned toward her and held her hand out "Hi, i'm Kai. What's your name?" She asked the Slytherin girl.

Astrid sat up as straight as she could and very carefully ate her soup. She was trying hard to keep in mind everything that the Headmistress had mentioned so that she might make a good impression.

Qaz was having no difficulties with the lesson, thanks to her father. Who knew that all of those formal holiday dinners would have such an unexpected benefit. If he could see her now...

Ooooh, they were going to eat too?! That sounded excellent! Truth to be told, Melly had been so nervous and scared that she had barely had the opportunity to eat as much as she needed. In fact, those last days she had just snacked and that moment, when she was absolutely thrilled, was probably the best for her to get something on her small stomach.

And so, she kept looking up and down the table, having completely forgotten her little task of behaving like a princess, waiting for the food to pop on the furniture the same way the silverware and the serviettes had. However, it did not seem that the food would appear in such a way for a creature appeared instead. Seeing it bang something on its head, Melly's mouth dropped as she watched it. W-w-what was that?! Was it a student who had misbehaved so much that was turned into that? And why was everyone looking at it as if its behaviour was normal? That was far from normal! Even for magic!

That was not the only thing that surprised her for seeing the food being delivered in that way made her eyes widen again as she watched it move. Yep, that was for certain, the girl would never get used to the wizarding world or magic completely. Nuh-uh.

Biting her lip, she turned to Issy and Juni who seemed to be completely at ease with the whole situation. They'd never support something cruel, would they? "W-what is that?" She asked them in a whisper, raising a finger to point at the house elf.

The soups looked delicious, but Cassandra didn't comment. There was time to comment, and this was not it. A bowl of split pea soup was placed in from of her and she glared at it... Why split pea?! There were other soups... she would have gladly taked a minetrone, or something else without meat... but split pea? Too many bad memories. But at least this time she was going to eat it... and not wear it.

But this was an etiquette lesson and as silly as it was to learn etiquette in DADA, she wouldn't complain. Headmistress Rae had her reasons and she trusted her... for now at least. She took the napkin and adjusted it flat on her lap. Her left (as Cassandra was left handed) picked up the spoon and she tipped the bowl away from yourself, spooning it in the outward fashion.

She took two spoonfuls, whiping her mouth with the napkin after each one, and left the rest in her bowl. She looked over at the roll on her bread plate. Cassandra broke a small end of the bread with her hands and then charmed her knife to spead a little butter of on it. After eating it, she whiped her mouth with her napkin and put it back down in her lap. Cassandra was never much of an eater...

She then looked at the house elf and gave it an encouraging smile. "May I please have a little water?" She asked of him.

With another POP! Algamus managed to find himself amongst the girls of Belle's school. Or as he liked to say it. "Hogwartes bad, very bad girls."

Headmistresses Raes has toldsies him to come and help with serving food. And being an elf he had no right to say no! Or he'd be baaad. VERYYYY baddd!

"Aglie is here to servsies salad, Mistresses!"

Sam turned to see another house-elf. She was begining to like them. They way they talked made her smile. Their voices were squeaky. On hearing that he was going to serve salad, she looked around. What fork were they suppose to use for salad? She thought they were only going to be served soup or salad. Not both. Urg.

Ok, so working from the outside-in, that means, she would use this fork right? Thats what she thought. She looked around to see what everybody else was going to use, just to be sure.

Laylee had never had bad table manners, but she had also never learned any of this. She could already tell she would be bad at it. She looked at her soup and was about to grimace, but, then remembered that that wouldnt be very polite to the host, that at the moment was non-existent.
Laylee grabbed her knife to butter her bread. It was delicious! Laylee thought it was quite funny that they were eating in class, in beautiful, but tacky dress robes.
Laylee leaned forward a bit to get her spoon and a curl flopped into her soup. Gross.
"Uhmmm, Professor?" She asked, pointing at her hair. "This is probably considered bad manners too right?" Laylee said, a small smile on her lips. She grabbed her wand, hoping it was okay to have your wand out at the dinner table, and she quickly cleaned her hair. Then laylee grabbed the hair tie on her wrist and pulled her hair back in a ponytail, short annoying curls bouncing out and surrounding her face; but, at least they werent long enough to get souped.

With house elves popping in and out and serving food, it almost seemed like home. Nikita had always liked the small creatures; most of them were funny or pleasant or comforting when one actually took the time to talk to them. She smiled at the elf as it dropped a serving of salad on her plate.

Nikita inspected the forks, then selected the one she thought might be correct. Glancing around the room, and seeing a few others girls holding the same fork in their hands, Nikita proceeded to plunge her utensil into the salad. The tines of the fork hit the plate beneath. Oops. Maybe she should be more...delicate in her handling of the silverware. Nikita quietly stabbed a tomato before she realized that her fork was facing the wrong way. She ate the tomato and turned the fork prongs down. Eating was much more difficult this way. If she ate holding her fork like this all the time, Nikita knew she would soon be stick thin.

Oh excellent...here comes the salad Kayla thought sarcastically. What she wouldn't give for a huge steak right about now or maybe a burger with fries on the side and a milkshake to wash it down. She moaned softly at the thought and her stomach gave a loud rumble and she quickly ducked her head to hide her face as she put a hand on her stomach. "Shh...now is not the time" she whispered.

It was so very easy for Issy to forget that not everyone was exposed to both Muggle and Magical world as she had been while growing up so Melly's question somewhat fascinated the small girl. Spot had been her family's House Elf all her life and she couldn't possibly imagine a life without him.

"That's a House Elf," she explained. "They're little creatures who live their lives to serve. Cook, clean, whatever. We have some who do our cleaning in the Common Rooms and dorms, the laundry, they cook all our meals. Often, they remain hidden, but some come out and show themselves."

And oh! Next course was the salad! Just like the fancy dinner parties back home. Lightly, she clapped her hands under the table, beaming and glancing over at Juni and Melly again.

"Next is salad," she crooned happily, eying the fork beside her plate. Inside out.

*Sheeta watched as a house elf popped into the room talking about salad. Something about the way the house elf acted made her giggle slightly and she did her best to stifle it.*

"Very good. You'll find that the next fork on the outside is the salad fork. Sometimes it is a little smaller than your dining fork," she held up the fork they were to use.

"Girls, I am very proud of how kind you all are, and I hope you will always treat the house elves well. They are a much loved part of this school. I do have to tell you, however, that speaking with a house elf in a formal dining setting is considered by some to be very rude. You have to address your host if you wish to comment on how good the food is, regardless of the fact that we all know I may not have even chosen the menu, let alone helped to prepare the food."

Sam looked up at Professor Rae to see that she had gotten the right fork! Score one for her. She then listened to how it was rude to tell a house-elf the food was good. Did that mean they couldnt talk to them at all? "Professor? Are we allowed to speak to the house-elf? Or do we have to act like they arent even there?" she asked.

Kelly smiled when headmistress Rae mentionned that they were doing a great job. Piper looked at the girl that just spoke. Good question Kelly thought

"Please just pretend they aren't there for now, although you can thank them for the meal after we're done with class," she took miniscule bites of her salad.

"Ok." Sam replied. She took her fork and poked a piece of lettuce with it. She then slowly placed it into her mouth. As she chewed it, she hoped she wasnt making to much crunching noice. She swallowed roughly and looked over at Vannah, Lex, and Ari.

Allie sat there quitely, eating her salad. Making sure she was acting like a lady.

Steelsheen took the salad fork and started on her salad. Her brow has deepened further when Professor Rae mentioned that house-elves shouldnt even be acknowledged in the dinner conversation. It was exactly that kind of double standard that Steelsheen hated with all her being. "So it isnt polite to acknowledge house-elves in polite society' she snorted at the irony of it.

Anna watched as Professor Rae demonstrated the correct fork to use for salads. Anna hated salads. Lettuce was only for flobberworms. She reached down to try and find that same fork, but when accidentally brought her palm down on the little parts that stick up, she only managed to cause the thing to fly about 6 inches up in the air and land upside down in her lap. She wasn't as great at this "lady thing" as she probably should be. Oh, well, at least it was the dumb salad fork.

She quickly retrieved it and held it up to examine it, mainly as a distraction if anything. Merlin she hoped no one had seen that little episode. The professor was explaining how appropriate it was to address the host at such an occasion, but she wasn't too sure what that meant. How do you address a host? Yo! Soup's kicking, dude! She fought the urge to giggle out loud at her thoughts. She was acting a little silly now. She composed herself and waited for the next set of instructions.

Melinda had her hand injured, from an accident during the weekend with glass. She tried to use the fork correctly for the salad. Ooops... The fork slipped her hand and all the salad landed on her lap.

"It's up to you to gauge your hosts. In my home, you'd see me address my elves, so you know that thanking them would be appropriate and welcome," Rae offered.

"Remember that when you are done with a course, you lay the silverware across the plate to signal you are finished. The silverware will be taken with the plate. If you do not eat salad, it would be appropriate to discard your fork on your plate now."

Allie layed her fork on her plate.
"When is this going to be over!" she thought. She already had to learn this all once, when she was eight for a girl scout badge, and she really didn't want to learn it all again.