Drew Barrymore with her new fiancé, Will Kopelman, at the premiere of Big Miracle. Photograph by Jeff Martin.

The so-called “whale movie” came to town last night with a splashy screening and a Potomac waterfront after-party for some 1,400 people. Big Miracle is the film’s official name, and it has an interesting, heartbreaking, and ultimately uplifting local angle. First, you need to know the name Bonnie Mersinger Carroll.

It was 1988, and Carroll—then Bonnie Mersinger—was working at the White House as the executive assistant for Cabinet affairs. President Reagan stopped by her West Wing office to inquire about an incident that was unfolding in Alaska, where three whales (two adults and a baby) had become trapped in the Arctic Circle by rapidly forming ice. The drama was receiving national media attention. “He saw that the National Guard was involved,” says Carroll, “and he wondered what the White House could do to help. And that’s how I met Tom Carroll.”

Chris Matthews with author Sally Bedell Smith. Photograph by Jeff Martin.

There are book parties—and then there are va-va-voom book parties fit for a queen. That’s what Sally Bedell Smith got this past weekend with the Washington celebration of her new biography, Elizabeth the Queen. I daresay even the Queen herself would have been gobsmacked.

Hosts Bernard and Joan Carl—he seriously rich with private equity money, together the owners of the French luxury linen company D. Porthault, and with homes in the Loire Valley, London, and Southampton—filled the rooms of their Kalorama mansion with the prettiest spring flowers, candles, and framed photos of the royal family at work and at play, and served a comforting Anglo menu. There was even a receiving line at the front door, as Joan Carl welcomed Washington’s version of aristocracy, high and low.

Smith, for her part, never budged from the library, where she sat near a fire signing copies of the book. Her husband, Washington Examiner executive editor Stephen Smith, worked the other rooms on her behalf. There were many rooms—even a carpeted tent—and many friends.

Alice Cowie, Carolyn Jones, Doug Jones, Leslie Jones, Gouverneur Siegel, and Lauren Duffy. Photograph by Jeff Martin.

Even with 44 exhibitors offering antique wares for sale, probably the most talked-about item at the Washington Winter Show on opening night was a plate that’s not on even the market. The one-of-a-kind Lenox porcelain dish, white with a yolk yellow border, has a historic and intriguing backstory—had President Kennedy not been assassinated it could well have been the chosen pattern for the Kennedy White House china service.

Both JFK and First Lady Jackie Kennedy ate off the plate, taking turns, as they decided whether it should be their White House pattern. The legend is they liked it and wanted to go with it. But due to the President’s death in 1963, the full service was never made, and only this one plate remains.

Who: Juleanna Glover, Elizabeth Glover, Kristin Glover, Christopher Reiter, Pepper Watkins

What: The “night before the night before Christmas” cocktail party

Where: Juleanna Glover’s Kalorama townhouse

When: Friday, December 23, from 8 PM on

The "Wedding Belles" exhibition party at the Hillwood Museum. All photographs by Carol Ross Joynt.

For better or for worse, I was a guest at more than 100 parties in 2011. Here are the top ten standouts:

1) The Washington Winter Show at the Katzen Arts Center (January 6)

An event that pulled together real Washington society—the elder cave dwellers and their younger counterparts—amid interesting (and a few affordable) decorative arts, good music, and good food.

 2) The Tudor Place Garden Party (May 4)

It always seems to take place on the prettiest spring evening. Lush food, great drinks, sweeping lawn, beautiful flowers, women in hats, and much camaraderie among Georgetowners young and old. For anyone who wants to mingle with Georgetown, this is the party.

3) The “Wedding Belles” Exhibition Faux Wedding Reception on the Lawn at Hillwood Museum

Caterer Susan Gage re-created a post-wedding lawn party as though it were scripted by Marjorie Merriweather Post herself, including a many-tiered wedding cake. On a beautiful, softly warm evening, guests got to sip, dine, and tour the gardens and the mansion.

4) David and Katherine Bradley’s Pre-Party for the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner (April 30)

Essentially every party the Bradleys host is a winner. They have that gift. But they throw a doozy of a true foodie dinner the eve of the WHCA bash. The exclusive guest list is “A” all the way: corporate, political, media, social, and some Hollywood.