Christmas Eve & Day 2014

First of all, let's talk about how we still have our Halloween pumpkins sitting in our house waiting to be carved. We keep saying- we'll carve really cool Thanksgiving pumpkins, we'll carve Christmas tree pumpkins, let's put them in the hall and forget that we spend money on those pumpkins... FYI they are still in the hall, we were going to carve New Year's pumpkins but maybe they'll be Valentines Day pumpkins...

I once spent a Christmas in Santa Barbara all by myself. I cooked delicious food for myself and watched a marathon of Christmas movies. I actually really loved it. I do however love having big parties at Christmas time too. We invited our housemates, the Shapiro's, and our friends the Jones's to a fancy Christmas Eve dinner.

Someday I will have a big dining room table that will allow us to invite over everyone we know but until then, our little one will do. I got to pull out my favorite dishes and my fancy polka dot champagne flutes that Thomas gifted me last year. I also discovered that somewhere along the line we have lost all but 3 salad forks. I am very talented, it takes a lot of skill to lose that many forks in just a couple of years.

The Christmas Eve Menu

Fresco's Salad with Gorgonzola and Walnuts

Garlic-Thyme New York Steaks

Broccolini & Rye Breadcrumb Gratin  

Creamy Au Gratin Potatoes

Warm Chocolate Brownies

Charlotte Russe 

Sparkling Apple Cider

This guy knows how to make a mean steak!

Thomas makes a Charlotte Russe every year at Christmas. It's a creamy vanilla dessert that you can easily eat too much of.

Ryan uses his Christmas Cracker confetti for hair. Classy.

We made a stocking for each of our guests and filled them with a few small presents each. It was so fun to walk around the store with Thomas planning out what we should get each person. After dinner we watched National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. I forget how inappropriate/hilarious that move is every year.

You may not be able to tell but our tree is super dead. We forgot to water it a couple days after we brought it home and it dried up in no time. The whole thing started to sag and lean to one side. I think it still looked nice and glowy on Christmas morning (above right) but we did have to take it down before the new year. I was afraid it would burst into flames at any moment.

Our housemates cleaned up this year with Christmas gifts! They were opening things forever! Does anyone else do the thing where you just pile up all the wrapping until everything is opened so you can enjoy the chaos of it all for a bit?

We got three cast iron pans this year- a Le Cruset Skinny Grill, an Aebleskiver pan and a mini skillet. We got some emergency preparedness items and a first aid kit, I got some Hunter boot socks and a new shirt.

Please notice how the little rubber tree is still alive!

 Thomas got a new sound bar for the TV. Everything now sounds even more amazing and we've watched a few good action movies to test it out. I think he loves it.

In the afternoon we went to see Into the Woods with the Shapiro's and the Jones's- it's amazing, I would highly recommend it. We realized that we had planned so carefully for the Christmas Eve dinner and breakfast that we ended up with no food in the house by Christmas night. Thomas and I headed to our favorite Chinese restaurant (A Christmas Story style) and had crab rangoons and General Gao's chicken for dinner. There was a great sunset and it was in the 50's during the day. I know a lot of people wish for a white Christmas but I will take a sunny, warm(ish) Christmas over a snowy one any year.

Ward Christmas Party

Somehow I got roped into throwing our ward's Christmas party this year. I love throwing a good party but I'm not going to lie, this one stressed me out a little. It took me a few weeks to actually sit down and start making lists and plans, it just seemed like such a giant monster to tackle.

Once I had a few (hundred) lists made I began taking bites out of the monster one at a time and things started happening. I spent a whole week cutting one hundred paper trees, another couple weeks arranging the musical program a whole Saturday measuring the gym, digging through the decorations under the stage and pricing food at Costco. It was a lot of work but what can I say, I like throwing a good party.

Friday night Thomas assembled a great crew to help set up. I was so impressed at how quickly it came together! The gals who hung all the paper trees and snowflakes made it look absolutely perfect! I hardly had anything left to do on Saturday. 

We had a carol service with a combination of congregational hymns and performances by some of our amazingly talented members. The event was Christmas Morning themed so we had breakfast for dinner and a hot chocolate bar. We asked the ward members to find some way of serving the community in preparation for the event and submit pictures for a little slideshow. It was so great to see the things people did to serve as the Savior did.

^^ The calm before the storm^^

There is something so satisfying about watching something you've planned come together. For a few moments I stood in the middle of the chaos with empty casserole dishes in my hands and felt so glad that things were going just as they should. Everyone loved the food (thanks to all those who brought things), they were laughing and smiling, the kids had a blast playing with the curtains on the stage. It was truly a success.

This sweet lady worked the hot chocolate bar all night. Bless her heart it was no easy feat, there was a constant stream of people piling on the toppings there.

^^ This is how I usually find Thomas at parties, he really is the life of it ^^

^^ And this is just the cutest baby I have ever seen ^^

Santa made an appearance at the very end of the party with a whole crew of his elves. They even performed a little dance before they left. It was priceless!

I have to give a huge shout out to all those who helped put this together. Thanks to those who made yummy breakfast casseroles, the set-up crew, those that sang and played instruments for the carol service and especially Thomas for putting up with piles of Christmas decor sitting around our house for the last two months and for following me around endless stores while I pick out juuuuust the right style of wrapping paper, chocolate chips etc.