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November 2015

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Your weekly gift guide to help inspire you and make your gift buying process a little bit easier this season!

Happy Cyber Monday and welcome to week 3 of our holiday gift guide! I can guarantee you that there is at least something here that your girlfriend, best friend, sister, or daughter wants for Christmas this year! I’ve polled all of my girlfriends and we are in agreement that this is a pretty comprehensive list of the average mid-20 year-old girl’s wish list! In fact, I love it all, so Mom, if you’re still looking for gifts, here you go! Especially #1 😉

Holiday GIft Guide for the 20 Something v2

1. Day Designer || 2. Fitbit || 3. Urban Decay Naked Eye-Shadow ||

4.  Slant Collections ‘Yay, Boom, Cheers’ Shot Glasses ||

5. Jonathan Adler Porcelain Dish || 6. Viktor&Rolf Perfume ||

7. Gigi New York Uber Clutch || 8. Moscow Mule Copper Mugs

the-everyday-hostess-holiday-2621

Caramel apples are one of my absolute favorite desserts this time of year. I love incorporating them into my parties, but they can be so difficult to serve and just aren’t the most graceful things to eat! I am always struggling with how to bite into them or how to cut them and sometimes it just isn’t worth the hassle!

These Mini Caramel Apple Cheesecakes are the solution and are the perfect little treat for your holiday gathering this year. They pack in all of the tastiness of a caramel apple without all the stickiness on your hands and caramel stuck in your teeth! They are absolutely delicious and always a crowd pleaser. Especially for all those cheesecake lovers out there like myself!

Cheers! at table w wine

Tablesetting with candles

Family, food, friends and football… This is what truly creates a perfect Thanksgiving!

So, of course, they were all featured in this year’s wonderful Friendsgiving party — which also happened to be festive, fabulous and FUN! 🙂 I hosted a group of friends for a potluck dinner, so they came with some tasty Thanksgiving bites and libations. But, every hostess has a few delicious ideas in mind for her dinners, so I had a small menu laid out in addition to what my guests brought to the table!

Menu:

Turkey || Cranberry Maple Brussels Sprouts

Mashed Potatoes || Spiced Apple Cider Cocktail

Cheers! Sparkling Apple Cider CocktailTurkey Thankgiving Cranberry and Walnut Maple Brussel Sprouts

The fall festivities wouldn’t have been complete without the gorgeous farm table, chairs and place settings provided by my friends at Celebration Event Rental. The silvers, golds and coppers were complemented perfectly by the rich-colored woods in the table and my homemade centerpiece … Swoon. Seriously, y’all.

Fall Party Tablescape

Fall Party Tablescape Decor

Two worlds collided at the fall party I recently hosted at my favorite gift and floral store in Dallas: My favorite shop and some of my favorite girls. The T Shop in Lakewood was generous enough to welcome the Circle Seven Five ladies and me into the shop for a hostess gift-making party!

Circle Seven Five

In case you are not local or have not heard of Circle Seven Five, CSF is an absolutely amazing group of young professional Dallas women founded by the lovely Cassidy in order to help form friendships and a sense of community and belonging amongst a bustling city. If you are in your mid- twenties, you know how incredibly difficult it can be to make new and meaningful friendships, but through fun events at local shops, restaurants, work-out studios, etc., CSF helps to form these types of friendships and connections. I have absolutely loved being a part of this organization, and if you are in Dallas, I highly recommend looking into it! Plus, I got to host this amazing party for the CSF girls!

The T Shop

The T Shop is my absolute favorite local gift and flower shop here in Dallas. Owned by the incredible Lori Trent, she has created the most luxurious and beautiful boutique in Lakewood. If you are looking for a flower arrangement or gift for a party or a florist for your wedding, The T Shop is your place. It is my go-to location for all of my gifting needs, plus her arrangements are absolutely amazing. Lori and her team are so detail-oriented and every bouquet comes out looking like it was styled for a magazine. My mom sent me my first flower arrangement from the T Shop, and I kid you not, I emailed Lori and told her how in love with her flowers I was, and I wanted her to do my wedding one day! Seriously, she is amazing!

 

Circle Seven Five Party Girls
We started the fall festivities with a themed cocktail party, where I served a variety of appetizers and a signature drink. The space didn’t call for a full dinner, but the event was at 6 p.m. on a weeknight, so I didn’t want the CSF ladies to leave hungry! Some of the girls were only acquaintances, so I wanted to make sure there was an assortment of snacks to accompany the libations.

I came up with this tasty and festive menu that was an absolute hit amongst the girls!

Appetizers:  

Grilled Cheese and Tomato Soup Shooters ||

Cranberry and Brie Pecan Tarts ||Caprese Bites ||

Pumpkin Gouda Dip || Turkey and Havarti Sandwiches

Sweets:

Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes || Caramel Apple Cheesecake

Cocktail:

Sparkling Spiced Apple Cider Cocktail

The CSF ladies enjoyed their drinks and bites while mingling and shopping around the store for fun birthday or hostess gifts. The store owner’s daughter, Kiley, and I then gave a fun presentation to the girls about how to give the perfect hostess gift. We talked all about when gifts are appropriate, what types to give, and how you can personalize it for each hostess.

Whenever I host a party, I always like to include a signature cocktail as part of the menu. Wine and beer are a given at my events, but it’s always fun to create a craft cocktail that aligns with the theme and formality of the party. Having an open bar gets very pricey, so this is the best way to mix up the drink menu without blowing the budget.

Sparkling Apple Cider Cocktail

This Sparkling Spiced Apple Cider Cocktail is the easiest craft cocktail to make for any type of fall or holiday party. Plus it is absolutely delicious and super festive! The spiced apple cider with the cinnamon just screams fall, doesn’t it?

Cheers! Sparkling Apple Cider Cocktail

One of my favorite parts of this recipe is that it can easily be made in large quantities. Often times, cocktails have to be made individually and specially crafted, which makes them harder to serve at large parties. This recipe is perfect for parties of all sizes and can be made and served in a large pitcher without losing any of its flavor or consistency.

Your weekly gift guide to help inspire you and make your gift buying process a little bit easier this season!

Alright, ladies! Let’s talk about what the 20-something year old man in our life wants this Christmas! Whether your boyfriend, husband, son, or brother loves the outdoors, beer, adventure, beards (I know mine sure does!), technology, or style, we’ve got you covered!

Here is week two of our holiday gift guide for the man in your life! (Let’s just hope my boyfriend skips over this post, so he doesn’t know what he is getting this year! 🙂 ) 

For Him Final

1. Beard Pack || 2. Bosca Bifold Wallet || 3. Apple TV

4. Allen Edmonds Men’s Shoes || 5. Go-Pro

6. YETI Rambler Tumbler || 7. Home Brew Kit

8. Personalized Scotch Decanter and Glasses

I am sure this will come as no shock to all of you, but one of my favorite parts of the holidays is all of the festive parties. I love that every Friday and Saturday night in December is filled with fun holiday extravaganzas. Whether it is a friend’s tacky Christmas sweater party or your corporate soireé, it is always so much fun to get dressed up and party hop between all of the different get togethers to see all of your friends and family.

Cranberry Brie Bites

With all of these events, I never want to arrive empty-handed, so I am always looking for new and festive recipes to bring that are quick and easy to prepare. These delicious Cranberry Brie Tarts fit the bill perfectly! They take a maximum of 15 minutes to prepare, yet look like you have spent all afternoon carefully crafting each one. The convenience doesn’t stop there! Besides being the simplest recipe ever to make, they are the perfect cocktail party grab-and-go appetizer. You can easily throw it on a napkin and don’t have to go through the balancing act of holding a plate in one hand and a cocktail in another! We all know what that’s like and it’s always a bonus when we can avoid it 🙂

Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes with a Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting

When planning my dessert menu for a party, I almost always include cupcakes. Cupcakes are the perfect dessert for any party because they are so simple to customize. You can easily tailor the cupcake toppers to match the theme and formality of the event, plus with the wide variety of frosting and cake batter recipes there are to choose from, you are sure to find a combination that will suit everyone’s taste preferences!

I recently made these delicious Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes with a Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting for a fall party that I hosted at The T Shop, and they were an absolute hit!

Your weekly gift guide to help inspire you and make your gift buying process a little bit easier this season!

With the holidays coming up, I’m sure your schedule is starting to fill up with lots of fun parties and get togethers! Whether you are going to a dinner party at your colleague’s house, meeting your boyfriend’s parents, or going to stay with friends or family over the holidays, it is always important to bring a gift to thank them for their hospitality!

Here is the perfect holiday gift guide for the hostess who loves to entertain!

Holiday Gift Guide For the Hostess v3

1. LAFCO Candle || 2. Bodum Chambord French Press || 3. Kate Spade Oven Mitt ||  

4. William Sonoma Monogrammed Cutting Board || 5. Cheers Wine Bag ||

6. William Sonoma Infused Olive Oil Set || 7. William Sonoma Home Monogrammed Soaps

These Grilled Cheese and Creamy Tomato Basil Soup Shooters are the cutest little appetizers I have ever seen! On these chilly fall days, who doesn’t love to enjoy a warm bowl of creamy tomato basil soup with their favorite grilled cheese sandwich? It is the ultimate comfort food if you ask me!

Grilled Cheese and Tomato Soup Shooters

I recently hosted a fall party at The T Shop, for which I provided a variety of seasonal appetizers and desserts. In crafting the menu, I wanted to include some popular comfort foods, so some sort of tomato basil soup was a must. This is not the easiest dish to serve at a cocktail party, so I came up with these adorable shooters, which are basically just large shot glasses with tomato soup in them and grilled cheese sandwich bites adorning the rim! It was perfect and a total hit amongst the guests!