Christmas Movie Double Feature: I (Cake) You.
Tyler and I love Christmas movies. Love. Love. Love them. In our early years of marriage, I would watch Love Actually all year long. Hugh Grant was, more or less, the third person in our marriage. We still drop lines in from the movie in so many of our everyday conversations to each other. For example: "Oh, you packed two pairs of running shoes?" "Well, you know... just in cases." The fun never stops.
But while my holiday lineup is set (1. Love Actually 2. The Holiday 3. Muppet Christmas Carol), Tyler's is equally unwavering (1. Elf 2. Family Vacation 3. Home Alone). We try to make it through all of these every December.
The only problem is our dang kids.
Joking, of course, but getting through six movies in a few weeks isn't the easy thing it used to be. Once we finally get both of the kids asleep and have a couple of hours to ourselves- we kinda like to party.
For our annual viewing of Love Actually, I traditionally make a Banoffee Pie which, despite Keira Knightley's opinion does not mean that I have "terrible taste in pie." It means I have awesome taste because any pie made of bananas, caramel, espresso whipped cream with chocolate shavings encased in digestive crust is amazing. But at this moment in life, I have neither the time or energy to make something so labor intensive- so instead, a boxed red velvet cake from Betty Crocker!
For our movie night, I actually squeezed out two types of red velvet cake. As the various layers were baking for a layer cake, I veered from the original 3-layer cake plan and used the final layer to make small trifles in little glass cups. Or "cup-cakes," as my sous chef, Viola, called them. It was so easy- we just stamped out little rings in the cake with the cups and layered them with cream cheese icing.
I also plucked a few flowers from the bouquet Tyler gave me for finishing my masters and dressed up the layer cake, too. I mean, its the little things people. Boxed cake mix, cream cheese icing, flowers... it doesn't take much to make an ordinary night feel like something special.
We may have only got through one movie, but we enjoyed two versions of cake- thus the double feature.
I'm not going to lie... Christmas movies, a picked up house, Tyler, a fire in the fireplace, and endless supply of cake (not pictured: buried under vanilla ice cream) was an awesome time.
So the big question is... what are your top three Christmas movies? I love hearing people's favorites!
*special thanks for the founder of the feast, Betty Crocker, for sending us cake + icing to participate in their fun, #iCAKEyou campaign. I accept with open arms any/all of these types of sponsored posts.
*images original to Aspiring Kennedy