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Mr Cardinal was very popular.
There was a bit of a fight over him actually. |
Yesterday morning I trotted off to Sweet Violets to buy some sort of centrepiece for the table for last night's dinner.
Rather than a single arrangement I really like the look of three small ones lined up down the table. First of all they are smaller, and therefore lower, but anything in threes looks especially nice.
As soon as I walked in I was captivated because the whole shop was a winter wonderland, and they had some really cute ornaments, which gave me an idea: how about an ornament at each place setting for my friends to take home with them?
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| The hedgehog: my personal favourite. |
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| But this little truck! |
I took a photo of the three arrangements when I initially set the table with (poorly ironed) white napkins, and later I switched them out for Christmassy ones. We might as well use everything Christmas that we possibly can!
How about this cute little guy with the books?
Here is a picture of the table with the Christmassy napkins. I like these napkins because they wash up so well and they require no ironing, major bonus.
The dinner menu was really easy and of course I prepped everything ahead of time so that I only had to turn on the oven and flick on a burner to saute the Swiss chard.
The Swiss chard was really delicious, it's one of my favourite greens. I sautéed it for a few quick minutes with a bit of olive oil and garlic.
I peeled and chopped several sweet potatoes and placed them on two baking sheets with olive oil and salt, and a bit of dried thyme. I shoved them in the oven in the afternoon so that I could just turn it on to 325 about 40 minutes before serving dinner.
Kim was asking me yesterday how I prepared the salmon and I highly recommend this method Kim! First of all I bought a huge piece, without skin or bones, of organic salmon from Norway, fresh from Costco. I placed it on a baking tray, drizzled it all over with a balsamic reduction, sprinkled shallots on the whole piece, then drizzled it with olive oil, adding salt and pepper. I slid it into the fridge where it marinated for about three hours, then popped it into a 350 oven about half an hour before serving it. It was delicious!
Today we'll be going to buy our Christmas tree and I cannot wait. Time to haul out more decorations!
Enjoy your Saturday, hope it's fun and Christmassy,
xoxDani
