Holiday Cookie Party ... with a Twist

Every December, I host a Cookie Party for my Twin Cities friends and family. What started as an idea to knock out all of my holiday baking in one fell swoop, morphed into an awesome way to kick off the holiday season with some of my favorite people. I invite friends and family from various social circles (some who know each other, some who don't - which I think makes it all the more fun) and task each person with preparing one to two holiday cookie recipes they're willing to share with the group. At the end of the day, we all go home with more Christmas cookies than we know what to do with (like for reals, cookies coming out of our ears!) and enjoy a fun evening away from husbands and kiddos. Andi's office makes the perfect place to host the party. His agency shares the space with a company who specializes in food photography and therefore has a huge industrial-size kitchen stocked full of cookie sheets, utensils and counter space to accommodate all of us.

So a few weeks ago when Andi told me he decided to move his agency to a new office space, my first question was "will I be able to host my cookie baking party this year?" I've come to look forward to this date on the calendar (and I know some of the other girls have too!) and I was bummed at the thought of ending this fun holiday tradition.

The more I thought about it, and after I searched Pinterest for ideas, I decided to host a different type of cookie party to kick off the holiday season. Enter: The "Stuff Your Box" Party. This year, I plan to host a holiday cookie exchange with booze and boys. I'm looping Andi it on the festivities (can you guess who came up with the party name?) and plan to invite all of my girlfriends and their significant others over to our house for food, drinks and a traditional holiday cookie swap. All of the actual baking will have to take place before the party this year so guests will be invited to bring two dozen of their favorite holiday cookie(s) and a bottle of wine. We'll drink, socialize and trade cookies. What could be better?

Now the fun part begins ... I've got some cute ideas for party invitations, cookie swap boxes and more so stay tuned!