Friendsgiving Charcuterie Workshop

Hello friends! For those that celebrated, I hope you had a blessed Thanksgiving Day. My husband had the day off work (for a change) and we enjoyed a nice meal with a dear friend that we invited to share the evening with us. After cooking a turducken (at the request of a friend) last year and all the fixins', this year I opted for catering from our local grocery store - way less work and mess. We had a traditional meal with ham instead of turkey, opened a nice bottle of wine and enjoyed a day of rest before the busyness leading up to Christmas.

Today I am sharing photos from another festive event I attended over the weekend. I took a Friendsgiving Charcuterie Workshop at KC Wine Co with a VERY fun group of friends! This was such a great event - and while I didn't really need a class on how to build a charcuterie board, I did learn a few things. The workshop was held in the incredible KC Wine Co Black Barn (a fabulous venue) and it was decorated beautifully for the holidays. There were thousands of twinkling lights, a full-size sleigh, lots of colorful trees and special cocktails for the holidays. The class included a 9" x 9" disposable plate to craft on, class materials and a take home box, crafting tips, and a complimentary glass of wine (we all had the hard cider - I had the Caramel Apple Pie Hard Cider and it was delish!). The workshop was sold out and the tables were decorated beautifully - each tray had a mini jar of honey with wooden dipper and a cute selection of autumn cocktail picks/skewers. We thoroughly enjoyed building our own boards...then we had a holiday cocktail together and watched the first half of the Chiefs game. I tried the Mistletoe Margarita (so good!) that came in an adorable glass that I was able to take home. Best of all, I had quality time with some of the wonderful women in my life...and that was just what I needed!

Christmas Cookies and Holiday Hearts

My cookies at the photo station...

Greetings friends! I had to stop by and visit with you again today - I wanted to share how my holiday spirits were lifted over the weekend...

My dear friend Leslie and I took a Christmas cookie decorating class and we had the best time. We had signed up for this class almost two months ago and had been anxiously awaiting the date. We took the class from a local small business owner that teaches cookie decorating classes in her home. Cindy's Cookie Co. is located in Olathe, KS...and if you are in the area, you should check her out! We arrived at 1:00 PM on Saturday afternoon for the 2-hour class. There were ten total students and she had everything set-up so nicely! We each had our own workstation with six fresh baked sugar cookies, several bags of royal icing and all the tools needed to complete our decorating. This was my first time working with royal icing and I did pretty good for a first attempt - in fact, everyone did...we had a great teacher. She gave an educational lecture on each of the tools and supplies, her tips and tricks, and where to purchase materials...we had a practice sheet to work with the icing before starting our cookies...plus she had a bottle of water and a snack at each workstation. 

The teacher's sample cookies...

My first cookies decorated with royal icing!

Once we decorated all six cookies, she had shopping set up, a station where we learned to tie bows for our cookie boxes, photo albums of her work for inspiration...even a staged photo area where we each placed our cookies for a photo op. She took pictures of each of us with our cookies...and had a gift bag for us when we departed that included a shiny new cookie cutter! It was a super fun afternoon and I am already looking forward to taking another class with her in the future. Best of all, the cookies were delicious. Goody, goody, yum, yum, yum!