Last year I hosted a hot chocolate and cookie exchange holiday party at my home. We had just moved in about 6 months before the party and the house was not complete. Now it is complete and I don’t have time to host a real holiday party! Adam and I decided to put together a mock holiday party like the one last year to show you how we celebrated. I couldn’t have the actual party this year, because I have to get to bed early for a half marathon the next morning! 

First I will begin by sharing my invitation as a free printable! I basically saw an invitation I liked online and recreated it my own way in a Word document. I printed these on a 5″x 7″ white cardstock. Click the picture to be redirected to the pdf file.

 

For food & drink choices I decided to go all out Christmas. I set up a hot chocolate bar using mason jars to hold the fixings. I re-used these mason jars from my bridal shower that my mother hosted last year. We use Ghirardelli hot chocolate mix.

And we created picture perfect hot chocolate. It was just as yummy as it looks!

 

We made a Christmas tree out of Southwestern Pinwheels (found at TiramiSusie’s)

 

Pine cone cheese balls (found at The Chickabug Blog)

 

Christmas sangria… and it is oh so good! (Found at Cooking Stoned.) I added a little triple sec as I think a sangria should have a liq our in it! For the wine I used a cheap Pinot Grigio from the grocery store, but if you want to get a little bit fancy and enjoy a glass while you are making the sangria I would try Luna Nuda Pinot Grigio. It has hints of apple in the flavor which would pair well with the apples in the sangria. They pride themselves on the Pinot stating it is “the way Pinot Grigio used to taste before it became popular.” Unfortunately I couldn’t have any, because I had a race the next day. But I had some while I was writing this post! 

 

And for the main dish we made spinach ricotta pasta from Budget Bytes. We added the meatballs (microwaveable and easy!) to this recipe for some added protein and used whole wheat pasta. 

 

Everyone brought their favorite Christmas cookies to exchange last year. This year I decided to make these cream cheese spritz cookies (found at Wendolonia). It was easiest to make the candy cane shape (I don’t have a pastry bag so I used a ziploc bag to create the shapes) and I couldn’t find any red food coloring! So these are neon pink candy cane stripes.

 

We decorated the entryway, coffee table and mantel so we could get into the Christmas spirit! 

 

 

 

I had a great time at our mini party and got to bed on time for my race! Oh, and here is a picture of me before my half marathon today… You don’t want to see the after pictures.