Getting Ready for a Party!

The goal is simple enough: plan and put together the Christmas party. The tricky part is that Nelly and I have a knack for dreaming up more...involved plans. So the planning starts...
October - Somehow, Nelly and I get onto the idea of the Christmas party. We'll put off planning for now, we say.

November - The first invitations get handed out. Mass e-mailing starts. For those people whose e-mail addresses bounce back at me, paper invations are sent out. RSVP date: Dec 15. Time to sit and wait until we hear back from the group.

But Wait!
Nelly and I can't possible sit and do nothing! How are we going to decorate the house? We always decorated Maciek's house, we can't possibly leave Nelly's house un-decorated! Hmm, stars? We did that along with snowflakes. We did the holly leaves too. Angels? Pretty, but too hard (as Jen reminds Nelly, Jen still has to make all of these decorations, so nothing too hard please). Reindeer? Penguins? Santa's sleigh! Nope, Santa's sleigh was Jen's idea, just as Jen was saying to keep things easy... Christmas trees? Candles? Christmas ball ornaments? No, no, no! Nothing seems to be right and it's all too hard!

But then...an idea! We CAN do Christmas ball ornaments! It would be so simple! Just a couple circles of bristol board, some spray paint for color, some string and ribbons and we'd be all set! So it's decided. Nelly's ceiling will be decorated with Christmas ball ornaments. "Phew!" There's one big decision out of the way!

But Wait!
What are we going to EAT? ...Now that, we decide, we can figure out later, when we know how many people we have to feed. The pressure's off on this question for a while.


December - Somehow, even though she's much too busy, Nelly finds time to come up with a party menu. We've got stuffed mushrooms, mashed potatoes, salad, pasta, bread sticks, etc. Wow. And when are we going to make all this? There's only one choice...we make food the day of the party, Dec. 22.

Now fast forward to Dec. 17, the end of my exams.

December 18 - It's shopping day. Party-decoration-making-supplies day. The list of stores includes Walmart, Michael's, the Dollar Store, Superstore, and maybe Staples. And somehow I had thought this idea would be simple. Silly me. Luckily I have Peter for company (although perhaps not so lucky for him...).

After about four hours of shopping, all the supplies have been found and bought, and brought back to my house.

Now for the fun part:spray painting bristol board! Oh, a few things other than the bristol board were spray painted too...but I swear that was completely unintentional. Granted, I rather like my heater with it's new-found glittery spots.



December 19 - Time to start the actual making of decorations.

Materials required: spray-bristol board, circle templates, needles, pens, scissors, ribbon, fishing line, ruler, cutting knife, and one very generous helper - Peter! In six hours we have a meagre pile of circles...things are looking grim.
Back at home it's time to start making deserts. Bake the cakes, make chocolate cups (did you know that mug warmers are great for keeping chocolate melted?), freeze the chocolate cups. Mom helps to cut out more circles and I finish cutting the rest. Peter has more circles for me later. AHHH! This was supposed to be simple!

December 20 (midnight to 2:30AM) -

This is my pile of circles. It may not look like much, but that's over 200 circles! Time to put the ornaments together.



December 20 - Peter drops off more circles, ready to be made into ornaments, but it's time for a break from circles. Back to desert making! Pity I didn't take pictures of the deserts. Anyway, time to make chocolate mousse, fill the chocolate cups, make the desert decorations. And once that's all done, it's back to circles.

December 20/21 (until approx. 4AM Dec. 21) -

Finally finish making all the ornaments at about four in the morning..they are ready for Nelly to pick up later. Here's the stats: (omitting the time it took to get to the point of actually making the balls) 474 individual circles + 4 hours of slotting circles and combining them to make 3D ornaments + 6 hours of threading and ribbon tying time = 237 ornaments for Nelly's ceiling.

And the end result? Take a look!




December 21 - Take a break and spend time with my relatives!

December 22 - Party day is here! And Nelly and I find out that when it comes to working in the kitchen, our ESP works so well, I may as well not even talk.
Back to party pictures

Home

Back