The best cookie exchange I have ever been to

I think you all know I run a children's literature book club for adults.  A few months ago, I jumped at the chance to join a friend's book club to have a chance to read some literature meant for grown-ups because I don't always make it a priority on my own.  I had no idea I was about to meet a really incredible group of women that are pretty intimidating to hang out with.  More on that another time.

For Christmas we decided to have a dinner with spouses instead of our normal book group.  The club was also planning to host a cookie exchange so we decided to combine both events since the holidays are so busy.  Our friends Kersten and Tai hosted at their amazing house.  Tai made his famous lasagna and then the rest of dinner was potluck, except Kersten asked me to help decorate as my contribution (she knows I cannot cook).  Kersten told me I could share some of the photos with you.

Here's her house all lit-up and welcoming.

We wanted the decorations to be affordable, but big enough to make a statement in her large living space so this is what we came up with (I got the idea from this post that I remembered seeing last year).

We used red cardstock to spell out some of Kersten's favorite phrases from Christmas carols, and then draped them across the room.  Larry, Tai, Kersten and just freehanded them as we were watching a movie one night and it went much faster than we would have predicted.

It's hard to get a sense of how many there were since her living space is so big (oh, to have that problem . . .)

Tai and Kersten were the perfect hosts.

And the star of the show was there gigantic two-story Christmas tree that they cut down themselves in the Uintas.

I was a really nice nice of visiting,

eating Tai's lasagna (which did live up to it's reputation),

and a lot of other great food.

Oh, and did I mention all the amazing cookies?  We gave a lot of ours away as quickly as possible because we would have gobbled them all by ourselves given a few days. They were that good.

I feel so lucky to get to know these girls.

It makes me so sad that we'll probably be moving away in a few months (more on that when we have some of the details worked out).