Christmas Event 2011

The Holidays have passed but I have a couple more things to share
from our Christmas celebrations!

This year, the Holiday Tea was renamed The Christmas Event.

LOBBY DECORATING
I helped decorate the lobby with a Nadja, a friend of mine. She coordinated the design of the beautiful combination of white candles and white flowers to fill the space! On Sunday we spent hours pulling out decorations and de-tagging items we purchased. All day Monday we worked on setting the stage decor, hanging garland over the entrances creating centerpieces for the cocktail tables and creating the layout of the lobby tables. Tuesday we arranged flowers and put the finishing touches on all of the different elements of design. And finally, on Wednesday we each decorated and hosted tables in the auditorium! A whirlwind of a week, but a great time!

Garland
This year was my first time to hang garland over doors.
3M hooks worked fabulously well!

We borrowed Christmas trees and white lights (of varying heights) from friends at church.
It was simple, elegant and a great way to decorate inexpensively!

Lobby

Flowers
We decorated with hydrangea, lilies, roses, and tulips. It turned out beautiful!

Cocktail Tables

If your in the market for bulk flowers:
Our flowers came from Costco. They require a 20 bundle minimum (10 stems in a bundle) and cost $8-10 per bundle. We choose a pick up date and the color/type of flowers we wanted. They had them ready for us early in the morning and then were free to arrange the flowers as we wanted for the event. Similarly, a few years ago I ordered flowers from Sam's Club to decorate the dinner tables at my wedding reception. I highly recommend this avenue if you are in the market for flowers. If you are uncomfortable arranging flowers there are lots of books on the subject and you may even have a friend that can help!


MAIN EVENT :: AUDITORIUM
In the auditorium there was a sea of beautiful tables decorated by different ladies in the church. Below are some pictures of the tables. Unfortunately I do not know who decorated each, but I thought they may inspire you to create something beautiful!

Gingerbread House
The host made it from SCRATCH! Incredible!
She even hooked up a light on the inside to turn on!

Candy
Children would love to wake up to a candy-themed breakfast!

White Winter Wonderland
Look around for pretty twigs in your yard, add white spray paint, a can and some Styrofoam or cement mix, and you have a centerpiece for years to come!

It's a Wonderful Life
I loved the creativity behind this table! The host printed out stillshots from the movie and cut them out to lay on the chargers. She added angel wings and a Christmas Village centerpiece to tie it all together. I LOVED THIS IDEA!

Festive Bow

Colorful Felted Trees

Seeing that I also decorated with trees I made I was drawn to this table to check out the craftiness! I really like the way they felted their trees and the super cute acorns and napkin rings they made!

Beautiful Floral Centerpiece

Nadja's Peacock Table :)

MY TABLE

I choose to decorate with a grouping of white trees that I made using felt, ribbons, feathers, cardstock and yarn. David helped me by cutting a log we had in the backyard into 3 different height stumps. I trimmed some branches to size to make place cards that I added berries, springs of evergreen and white paper flowers to. I covered the table with green burlap and added gold felt rosettes to compliment my chargers. The finishing touches was a fun folded napkin and and red felted flowers as party favors.

Trees

Place Cards

Napkin and Party Favor

To see pictures from prior year's events:
Holiday Tea 2009
Holiday Tea 2010


It was LOTS of fun working on this project! The downside was the amount of time it took to decorate the lobby and needing to leave Gavin with someone else to watch over him so I could work faster and more efficiently. My friend, Lisa, watched him on Monday and he stayed with childcare at the church on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings.

A picture from the morning before I took him over to Lisa's.
He does not look upset at all; but it was a tough morning for me.

Part of the time he hung out with me while I decorated.
He enjoyed looking at the Christmas tree lights.

Tuesday evening while I was at the event David watched G.
He took him to the youth group meeting he had.
G was dressed quite dapper in a cute sweater and coordinating pants!

On Wednesday evening David kept G and his 2 cousins, Josh and Jenni while my sister attended the event with me. In the background is a list of fun activities the kids brainstormed that they would want to do with uncle David.