Every year one of the highlights of the holiday season for me is hosting our annual holiday party. I love getting to see so many of our friends and loved ones from all the different areas of our lives together in one place, laughing and enjoying each other’s company. We feel so very blessed to have such wonderful people in our lives.
This year I opted for a light blue, silver and white color scheme and I loved the way it looked when all was said and done. The whole thing had a kind of airy, whimsical feel. The gorgeous party printables from the lovely ladies at TomKat Studio definitely helped pull it all together and added a nice finishing touch.
Definitely one of the biggest hits of the whole night was the hot cocoa bar. People just loved this. We put our under-used fondue set to work keeping the cocoa warm, with the accompanying bowls holding assorted garnishes. (We also had bottles of Kahlua and Bailey’s on the table for an adult variation – quite a popular choice!) This was such a huge hit, I think we’ll be doing it for years to come.
If you follow me on Facebook, you know that I recently tried a new (to me) macaron method, and I am a total convert. For the party I made two varieties of macarons and they were far, far better than anything I’ve made before (…and I really loved the ones I had made before!) I’ll do a tutorial about this soon. As a side note, always keep an open mind when choosing your serving dishes for a party. I repurposed these hurricane candle holders for the party and they were the perfect way to display so many macarons.
My schedule has been very hectic lately so I had to throw this together with a little less planning than normal, but in the end we were really happy with how everything came together. Having done it so many years in a row, it gets easier every time since there are some staple crowd favorites that must be included. I opted for very low maintenance dishes to fill in the gaps and it made for an elegant but fairly stress-free event. The best kind! Our full menu is below. I’ll be sharing some of these recipes over the next couple of weeks. There are a few you will not want to miss!
Savory Appetizers
Antipasto Skewers
Corn Cakes with Goat Cheese and Roasted Tomatoes
Cranberry Brie Bites
Stuffed Mushrooms
Mini Mac and Cheese (this recipe, served in small mason jars)
Herbed Yogurt Cheese Dip with Assorted Crudités
Sweet Treats
Nutella Cherry Hazelnut Fudge
Peanut Butter Fudge
Chocolate Candy Cane Cheesecakes
Double Vanilla Cupcakes (cake/frosting)
Eggnog Macarons
Coffee Macarons
Sugar Cookies with Royal Icing
