Brian and I haven’t had a proper party since my 30th, and that was just a super casual but big BBQ. I spent hours and hours making four different kinds of potato salad because I assumed all of Los Angeles loved potato salad as much as I do. You know which was the favorite by the way? The super classic potato, egg, pickle, mustard, and mayonnaise one. You know it. But you know what my secret ingredient is? Miracle Whip. BOOM. I done made my friends eat and love the whip with the zip. It’s just so delicious if one would give it a chance.
I digress.
All of our friends have their party traditions — July 4th at Parva, Hayride/Halloween party at Graciosa (these are code words for the couple), not to mention the million other parties they throw. So we figured it was time for us to give a shit and throw a proper party that is, like, planned and stuff.
But naturally, if I’m going to spend a ton of money and time I also want to blog about it and get a lot of content from it. So I have a photographer — not just a photographer — David Tsay coming on Friday to shoot the house all done up and I’ve been really, really busy making all the decorations.
First we shopped for the tree:
We went to Home Depot during the day IN NOVEMBER to buy a tree. I mean who buys a tree in November? The Hendersons. This is Brian asking me, “Is this our tree?”
“Yes, ” I confirm that this was our tree. A seven foot noble fur.
I have a big white fake tree and a big light pink tree that are both awesome (left over from a shoot), but Brian requested, nay, INSISTED, on the real deal. When men insist on such adorable things as “wanting the real Christmas smell” then you put away your obsession with the perfectly styled hip/glam holiday that you pictured in your brain and you embrace what makes people happy.
So I started shopping:
The color palette: hot pink, navy, white, and gold. Supes predicts.
I’m loving these classic bows and might go crazy with them.
Simple ball ornaments, but now I need to make a bunch of interesting ones.
I’m making a massive stack of hand painted “presents” so I started working on those last night. I’ll need like 20 more, but I’m liking where it’s going.
And all this is happening.
If this wasn’t my job, I think I would actually need to quit my job in order to get this done. SOOO much to do. Brian is going to make most of the food but I’m dictating it by what pretty dishes I want to use. It’s not, “Oh what platter should I put the baby sandwiches on?, ” It’s, “Hey Brian, I want to use my new polka dot oblong platter so we need food that will look pretty when styled on this, will work with the shape, size, and color palette, but not cover it up too much.” I’m easy going like that.
In other news, as I’m typing this I’m realizing that I could use a food stylist help on Friday. Yes, in two days from now. So if there are any budding food stylists in LA that want some beautiful portfolio shots, then email me at emilyhenderson – at – me. com.
On the list of DIYs we have:
1. Message in a bottle ornaments. (I’m VERY excited about these.)
2. DIY wrapping paper for beautiful prop presents.
3. Mantel styling
4. Console styling,
5. UM, TREE styling
Oh and I have lots of glass domes that are begging for stuff to go under them:
I’m thinking lots of snow and maybe a mini world of some sort.
Must run. I have a lot of crafting to do …