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I'm Shay! I’m a cookbook author, lifestyle blogger, travel agency owner, wife and mama who loves making every day special for my family.

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Mix & Match Mama

Christmas ·

Sixth Annual Recipe Exchange: Breakfast Edition


On Tuesday, I hosted my Sixth Annual Recipe Exchange and it was a Breakfast Edition.
This is truly one of my favorite things to do during the holiday season.
Each year, we have a different theme (appetizers, desserts, side dishes, casseroles), everyone turns in their recipe in advance so that a little book can be made for the party, we bring something to donate for a charitable cause (we’ve done the Angel Tree before and we donate to the food pantry), and then everyone brings their favorite dish and we all have a big feast.  I provide the drinks, any additional accompanying food, the festive music and twinkle lights and we have the best time!
Over the last six years, this has been such a wonderful way to celebrate the holidays with friends, get new recipes for my own family to use throughout the year and do something good for our community.  I love these recipe exchanges :).
This year was even more fun because we all came in our pajamas.  Nothing goes better with a big feast than stretchy pj pants. #amen
Here’s a little peek…
 Slow Cooker Hot Chocolate with marshmallows and candy canes to stir.
 Getting ready for my Cranberry Mimosas 🙂

 

Each year, I give them their Christmas gifts at this party…this year, buffalo plaid blankets.  They are so soft!

 

 

I pulled out my big plates for this occasion…lots of food was piled on them!

 

 

Little tags so that everyone knows who brought what.

 

 Our voting station.  It’s a fierce competition over here!

 

 My favorite people all piling their plates full of breakfast goodness.
So, the thing is…Karla is never dull :).  I love these two!  Karla and Sheaffer.

 

 

 I’m so blessed to do life with these ladies.
I love you girls all so much!
So, once more, let’s recap (for those of you who might want to do this too!)…
1. Everyone emails me their recipe in advance and I compile a book.
2. Everyone brings their prepared dish the night of the party.
3. We eat, eat, eat and then vote on our favorite (the winner gets a prize!).
4. Everyone leaves with a party favor and a copy of the recipe book.
Over the years, we have done a Cookie and Bar Exchange (I provided dinner and then we ate the sweets), we have done a Side Dish Exchange (I provided a ham, dinner rolls and dessert), a Casserole Exchange, and then we’ve done an Appetizer Exchange twice (we did it back in 2011 and decided to repeat it this last year too).
I always provide drinks and dessert to round things out.Side note: we decided that every year should be done in our pajamas…it seriously made things so much more fun!

This doesn’t have to be a holiday party either!  You could do your own recipe exchange any time of year…a summer exchange would be fun too!I made this for our exchange…

 

…Apple Breakfast Cobbler.
You can find the recipe here.
The winner of our favorite recipe went to Lisa who brought a Southwestern Breakfast Casserole.  I will make it and post it on my blog soon!
And, the winner for bringing the most canned food was Andrea!  She brought 275 cans of food to be donated to our local food pantry.
We loaded up Andrew’s truck and drove everything to the food pantry the following day.
Such a wonderful night with my friends.
xo
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Comments

  1. Erika Slaughter says

    Is one of my favorite nights of the YEAR!! Great food, fabulous friends, and the best hostess…seriously so much fun!! It doesn't hurt that the party favors are always amazing! Thank you, friend!!

    • shaeken says

      My grandma and I made recipe books for our family using great-grandma's recipes after she passed away. If you contact a print shop (such as Staples, though for any Oklahoma folks, I recommend QuikPrint), they will print your pages on the paper you choose, put a front and back cover on and bind with a comb – it makes it easy to keep with the rest of your recipe books without getting damaged 🙂

  4. Leslie says

    How fun! It sounds like you ladies have a ball. Where are the buffalo plaid blankets from?? Seriously so obsessed with that seasonal pattern.

  6. kelly says

    Oh I forgot to mention the best part!! The candy canes as stirrers for the hot cocoa! What a brilliant idea – maybe I live under a rock, but I never thought of that doing that (even though it's so obvious.) My kids thank you 🙂

  7. Sheaffer {Pinterest Told Me To} says

    I had the best time as always! The food was of course delicious, but all of you girls make me so thankful to have such strong friendships. And MY WORD at the laughing. We've got a sweet bunch of friends, but they are also HYSTERICAL, and I'm grateful for that. 🙂 And Karla? No words! And my new blanket? Well, I'm already having to fight Carter for it. Love all you girls so much! xoxo 🙂

  10. ebaker says

    How do you decide who's invited? I have so many friends I would be afraid someone would get their feelings hurt if they found out I had something like this and they weren't invited..

  22. Kim says

    Are you the only one that gives a gift? You are very lucky to have such a big group of girlfriends! Love the breakfast theme and PJ's.

  25. Mal says

    I am so making a girls night out of this idea in the near future!

    Side note – I know you share in my excitement for Michael Buble's Christmas Special tonight! Cannot wait. #longestdayever

  33. Megan says

    I noticed a picture of a cavalier in the background of one of your food pics, do you have a cavalier? The only thing cuter than an ashby picture would be ashby and a cavalier!!

  35. Lauren says

    So much fun!! We are hosting a big party this weekend for about 40 people and I'm doing several crockpot things. Would you mind sharing with me your crockpot hot chocolate recipe? I searched your blog and it's possible I overlooked it. So sorry! Thank you!!!

  39. Unknown says

    Looks like you all had a blast, such a fun idea!

    Love this happy little space on the web, you are such a great source of encouragement. Thanks for sharing with us!

  41. Unknown says

    Such a fun idea! I would love to host something like this, but where do the kids and hubby go? Does it end early enough at night that the kids can come home and sleep at a reasonable hour?

  43. Carin says

    I am an avid reader, but I haven't ever commented. Karla was my potluck roommate freshman year. She is a doll – the very best! So fun to see her smiling face today as I was reading.

  44. Rachel says

    How great is this?! You have some awesome girlfriends! We will definitely be trying that out this next year. It just looks like such a good time. And what is better than a party in JAMMIES??

    Thanks for sharing 🙂

    -Rachel at thefashionistahousewife.blogspot.com

  48. Kjlb37 says

    I totally stole this idea from you Shay! I am hosting our small group from church on Sunday night and we are doing appetizers as well as collecting canned goods for our local rescue mission.Thanks for sharing this with us!