Get into the holiday spirit with a deck the halls Christmas party! This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #BakeInTheFun #CollectiveBias
How soon is too soon for holiday cake bars, Christmas wreath donuts and ugly sweater sugar cookies? Some say it’s never too soon for throwing a Christmas party, some wait until after Thanksgiving. We usually have our deck the halls themed Christmas party the weekend after Thanksgiving. This gives us enough time to enjoy the Christmas decorations and all the fun that comes along with it, without spoiling Thanksgiving.
Deck The Halls Christmas Party
We’re throwing a Christmas decorating party with fun recipes, ornament decorating and of course – we’ll deck the halls to get ready for Christmas! If you’re looking for a deck the halls Christmas party theme ideas, you’re in for a treat. Plus, we’re bringing you the chance to win a KitchenAid Mixer – see the contest widget below!
It’s just not a deck the halls party without amazing Christmas themed desserts, right? For our holiday party, I’m making a Pillsbury„ Funfetti® Holiday Cake Mix bars, Pillsbury„ Funfetti® Holiday Cake Mix donut wreaths, and ugly sweater sugar cookies with lots of Great Value Milk to go around!
I’ll be using M&M’s® White Peppermint and M&M’s® Hot Chocolate in the holiday cake bars. I’ll also use Pillsbury„¢ Funfetti® Holiday Vanilla Flavored Frosting, M&M’s® Holiday Milk Chocolate and M&M’s® Holiday Peanut to decorate them. Drooling yet? You should be.
I decided to go with an all out M&M’s® party when I found out about the great initiative at Walmart. For every two 9.4oz or larger bags of M&M’s® purchased, up to a gallon of milk will be donated to the PourMilkLove.com drive!
It’s estimated that one in six children rely on Feeding America food banks each year, so buy your M&M’s® at Walmart this year – no exceptions!
Although it is in demand, milk is not often donated to food banks. This means children and families in your community may be missing out on the essential nutrients supplied by milk. The Great American Milk Drive will deliver a gallon of milk, packed with all of the goodness, like protein and 9 essential nutrients, to a family in need in your local community. Shop Walmart for your M&M’s® and make your deck the halls party an event that will pay it forward to a family in need! You can also donate here if you wish.
Lets get started with our Deck the Halls party by baking up some amazing Holiday Cake Mix bars using Pillsbury„¢ Funfetti® Holiday Cake Mix! You know me – super simple and super tasty! This recipe is one the kids can definitely help you with.
Pillsbury„¢ Funfetti® Holiday Cake Mix Bars Recipe
You’ll need a box of Pillsbury„¢ Funfetti® Holiday Cake Mix, milk, egg, canola or vegetable oil, peppermint extract, M&M’s® White Peppermint and M&M’s® Hot Chocolate, as well as M&M’s® Holiday Milk Chocolate and M&M’s® Holiday Peanut for extra fun and decoration on top. I’m going to split the batter and use M&M’s® White Peppermint in half and M&M’s® Hot Chocolate in the other half.
We’ll being by gathering up all of our ingredients.
Next we’ll add everything into a single bowl (see recipe below).
Mix well with a mixer, the batter will be very thick and sticky, somewhat like bread dough!
Grease a 9×13 pan – I like to use butter.
Spread batter into 9×13 pan and top with your favorite M&M’s®.
PRO TIP: Spray a spatula with cooking spray to make spreading the batter a cake-walk!
You may be wondering why I have frosting in the photo above. Well, that frosting went to good use in these fun Christmas Wreath Cake Donuts recipe which we’re also serving up at our deck the halls party!
Do these holiday cake bars look delicious or what?
Cake Mix Donut Wreaths
Click the picture or the link to find this fun recipe for Cake Mix Donut Wreaths. We used Pillsbury„¢ Funfetti® Holiday Cake Mix along with Pillsbury„¢ Funfetti® Holiday Vanilla Flavored Frosting and colorful M&M’s®.
Ugly Christmas Sweater Sugar Cookies
We rolled out a batch of sugar cookie dough and used a ugly Christmas sweater cookie cutter we found at Walmart to cut them into the shape of ugly Christmas sweaters. We decorated them with Pillsbury„¢ Funfetti® Holiday Vanilla Flavored Frosting and the sprinkles that came with the frosting as well as M&M’s® Holiday Milk Chocolate.
Deck The Halls Christmas Decorating Party
To begin our table set up we’ll start with a nice white table cloth and drape a colorful Christmas-y table cloth at a kitty-corner to the table, leaving a triangle edge on the front of the white cloth. We’ll party with our food on one side and our ornament decorating station on the other. We’ll try to keep the glitter away from the food! 😉
Christmas Cookies, Cookie Bars and Donuts
To one side of the table we’ll lay out our dessert spread. We’ll have our cookie bars, fun ugly Christmas sweater sugar cookies, Christmas wreath donuts and of course milk to wash down all the deliciousness!
I’m using decorative platters and a clear decanter for the milk. For the milk, I’ve used a nice carafe and for the guest cups, I’ve decorated mason jar mugs with festive holiday ribbon. The whole feel is quite nostalgic, don’t you think?
Christmas Ornament Decorating Station
Everyone loves things that twinkle on the tree, so we’re rounding up the materials and setting up a Christmas ornament decorating station where all of our guests can have a little fun and take home an ornament for their Christmas tree! The ornament decorating station is only limited by your imagination! Use any kind of ornaments you think your guests will like and any kind of decoration which pairs well with those ornaments. For instance, if you use wood ornaments, acrylic paints and brushes will do well.
Ornament decorating station includes:
- Ornaments
- Glue
- Glitter
- Glitter Pens
Deck The Halls Christmas Decorations
Today we’re decorating our fireplace and mantel for Christmas. We’ll replace the clock with a wreath and replace our autumn decoration with Christmas decorations!
We accumulate new decorations each year, so we pick out which ones we want to display on the mantel and the rest of the Christmas decorations get spread throughout the rest of the house.
We’ll also put up our Christmas tree and decorate it with ornaments. When we travel, we like to buy Christmas ornaments that will remind us of the destinations we’ve visited. That way, when we get old – and we all will – we’ll be able to reminisce and remember all the fun times we had traveling!
This is one of my favorite ornaments, one we got when we visited Mt. Washington in New Hampshire – we took the Cog Railway to the top and there was a little gift shop up there. Although it was summertime, they did have a few Christmas ornaments, so we picked up this little wooden train to remind us of the trip up Mt. Washington on the Cog Railway!
What are some of your favorite holiday recipes?
Related Recipes:
Holiday Cake Mix Bars Recipe
Deck The Halls Christmas Party
Ingredients
- Pillsbury™ Funfetti® Holiday Cake Mix
- 1 egg
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1/3 cup vegetable or canola oil
- 1/4 cup M&M’s® White Peppermint
- 1/4 cup M&M’s® Hot Chocolate
- 1 overfilled teaspoon peppermint extract
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees
- Stir together cake mix, oil, egg, milk and peppermint extract
- Split batter, add and mix in M&M’s® White Peppermint to one half of the batter and M&M’s® Hot Chocolate to the other
- Spread batter into greased 9×13 pan w/M&M’s® Hot Chocolate on one side & M&M’s® White Peppermint on the other side
- Bake for about 20-23 minutes or until toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean
- Allow pan and bars to cool completely before removing; cut and serve
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What a fun way to kick off the holiday season! I love the ugly sweater cookies!! (client)
Hi Debbie,
Thanks for your question! I split the batter and keep it split when I add it into the pan. That way I have Peppermint Hot Chocolate on one side and Peppermint with M&M’s® White Peppermint on the other side of the batch. Just a little fun to have with two flavors of M&M’s® in the bars 🙂
Merry Christmas!
Love these great holiday recipes. One of my favorite things is baking goodies for Christmas.
I think the Peppermint cake bars would be great!
My favorite are the Peanut Butter Kiss cookie recipe, and my grandmother’s stuffing recipe. Both have to happen for it to be the holidays. Everything else is up for debate.
In the funfetti bars, what is the purpose of splitting the cake batter and adding peppermint M & M’s to one batter and hot chocolate M & M’s to the batter if you’re going to throw it all together in the same 9 x 13 pan?
All of them good, the ones that looks like there was candy wrapped up in sugar cookie dough with sprinkle on top looks delicious and pretty
I LIKE TO HAVE A CHRITMAS PARTY, MAKING THESE COOKIES AND TEAS.
My favorite recipe is the holiday cake batter fudge!
Your post has made me so excited for Christmas. It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas.
What a fun party set up. I love your photos!
Oh what total fun. I love these ideas for yummy holiday parties. Thanks so much for sharing and for the chance to win 🙂
Those bars look lovely! I love the color. I want to try the Hot Chocolate M&Ms.
That sounds like fun! Holiday treats always fuel creativity!! 🙂
Our church is having a ‘church decorating Christmas party’ next week…might be nice to bring them a few treats to fuel their creative spirit!