A Very Brie Christmas!
This past Friday night, I fulfilled all of Caleb’s dreams by cooking him dinner and decorating our Christmas tree. But only after I had a nervous breakdown about how I wasn’t “the type of woman he wanted me to be,” after which I made him hold my hand while I shopped for supplies. “Good evening ladies,” the man at the Christmas tree ornament shop said to us when we walked in the door.
“Don’t worry,” I told him when he realized that Caleb was a man, and started profusely apologizing. “It’s an understandable mistake.”
Because I think it’s kind of funny that I did something housewifely involving crafts, I’m going to write a “How To Decorate Your Apartment for the Holidays on a Budget!” in the style of a mommy blogger or Gwyneth Paltrow’s ghost writer on Goop. So without further ado…
A Very Brie Christmas!
(A Guide On How To Decorate Your Christmas Tree On a Budget)
When I was little, the holidays were my absolute favorite time. Our entire family would get together to decorate the tree. We weren’t allowed to touch it because my mother had a whole design scheme worked out with all of these antique ornaments. She was a real Nazi about it, but it’s thanks to my mother that I have such classy taste today!! Moms are the best like that. I totally love her personal style!
Another reason why the holidays were my favorite was all of the good food! I love holiday food so much that one time, when I was Christmas caroling with my Church Youth Group, I ate so many sugar cookies I threw up in my hot chocolate!! So totally gross, I know, but little kids are so cute, right? I love kids, especially French kids!!
I’m not that handy in the kitchen, but I wanted to cook my boo dinner because that’s what girlfriends do!! So I consulted my friend Caitlin’s totally adorable blog about food, Amour Fou(d), and choose a simple seasonal recipe!!
One of my favorite things about my neighborhood—besides the cocktail bar The Clover Club haha—is that shopping is so totally European here. Like, you can go to Union Market, the gourmet food store, and get like whatever you need all at once, but all of the produce is rotten there!! So instead, we just shop at the little tiny neighborhood stores—there’s a vegetable store, and a butcher, and a bakery that has such good crusty bread!! Whenever I go shopping for food, I feel so Amelie!
The recipe I decided to make was an orecchiette pasta with brussel sprouts and pancetta. Yum.
http://amourfoud.blogspot.com/2012/11/orecchiete-with-brussel-sprouts-and.html
As a side dish, I made a warm pistachio vinaigrette!
http://amourfoud.blogspot.com/2012/08/pistachio-vinaigrette.html
I let Caleb pick out the wine to go with dinner because he practically is a somelier compared to me!!! For desert, we had eggnog from the store, because I didn’t really have time after my exercise class to make it fresh. I know, Martha Stewart, I’m a total failure. But whatever, women can’t be perfect at everything!!
The dinner was like really, really delicious. After I did all of the dishes, we took out the supplies I bought at the homeware store, and got ready to decorate the tree. It would have been easy to just buy decorations, but I retained all of my arts and craft skills from Kindergarten, so I wanted to make some of my own!!
Here’s a step by step guide so that you can make a tree just as beautiful as ours, only don’t make it too beautiful because then I’ll be jealous haha.
1. One of my favorite things my dad for me when I was a little girl was lift me up, and let me put the angel on top of the tree. I had to beat my sister—literally!—to get to him first. But our tree is kind of a little deformed. It has two stalks on the top instead of one! I always kind of wanted a down syndrome baby, and now I have one in my living room in the form of a dead plant haha! The only problem with it is that we can’t have one angel on top, not unless the angel were 2 feet tall and super fat.
My solution to make it pretty was just to wrap a gold glittery ribbons around each stalk, and cover it with a bow! Voila! Tres chic! Now the tree looks like a gilded down syndrome robot!
2. They had the CUTEST little cocktail umbrellas for $8 at the store, so we bought those. There were 24 in the package. We opened them up, and stuck them in the branches. Instant bulbs! My recommendation is to put them close to lights, so that they are illuminated. They’re plastic, so I hope they don’t explode into flames when we’re sleeping!
3. When I was younger, I loved putting glitter on things, but my mother never let us do it in the house because she said it was so messy. “The maid already has enough work,” she used to say to us, and she didn’t mean herself! But Caleb is my boyfriend, not my parent—sometimes!—so he let me make a plate of sparkly confetti to do whatever I wanted!!
I took popsicle sticks, and smeared them with fabric glue. Then I dipped them in the confetti, and the pieces stuck like stained glass or shrapnel! They made such pretty little icicles!! Caleb drilled a little hole in the top of each one, and we put in a hook to hang them. So pretty!!
4. Caleb wanted to get plastic soldiers for the tree, but I said to him, “no way,” so we compromised with game animals! He took them outside, and spray painted them silver. I wouldn’t let him do it inside the house, because one time my sister spray painted her whole apartment silver, and she got evicted! Now she lives at home with my parents!!
Before Caleb spray painted the animals, he drilled little holes through them, and inserted hooks. Then we hung them on the ends of branches, so they dangled. Adorable! This little gorilla looks like my friend Shark, I love it!
5. Oh my god I forgot to mention we used white lights all over! So pretty!!
6. I had my little heart set on making a star, so Caleb glued together a bunch of popsicle sticks in a star shape. Then I did the thing with the confetti, and we suspended it between the two retard branches using black thread. It looks like the North Star suspended over Bethlehem. That reminds me, I want a creche so badly, if you have a good idea how to make one on the cheap, pass it my way!!
Once the tree was done, it looked like the tree version of a drag queen! Caleb said to me, “My god, that was a nightmare.” And I said to him, “I love you too baby boo!”
All of this for under $25, plus the cost of the tree ($40), plus the dinner ($15), plus the wine ($40), plus my sanity!! Just kidding, I had the best time ever, I can’t wait for the next one!!!
xoxoxoxoxo Happy Holidays!!!! xoxoxoxoxo
<3
Brie
