Christmas in July? Our Halfway to Christmas Celebration Was Pure Holiday Joy!

Who says Christmas only comes once a year? Not us! Our final Halfway Holiday of the season was Halfway to Christmas, better known as Christmas in July. Continuing the tradition from our previous celebrations, we gave our mini tree — and our home — a lovely Christmas makeover.

The only thing better than celebrating with one guest was celebrating with two! This year, Melisa invited her friend Mica to join us. My husband and I had such a great time getting to know her. Between conversations and laughter, we spent the evening working on a fun little arts-and-crafts project involving Styrofoam cups, toothpicks, and markers.

The end result? These colorful, igloo-style holiday lanterns that glowed beautifully once we placed tealights underneath. The clever idea to poke holes into the cups for that glowing effect was all Mica’s — and it turned out amazing!

Between arts, crafts, and good conversation, we also made sure to stuff our faces with appetizers like: salami and crackers, Pico de Gallo with chips, and Dirty Santa drinks which included cherry juice, ginger ale, grenadine and coconut rum that looked as cheerful as they tasted.

When it came time for the main course, we served olive bread rolls and so much more!

This year, we decided to make Argentine empanadas in honor of our new guest, Mica. Normally, our holiday menus tend to feature American, Chinese, or Caribbean dishes, but this time, we wanted to do something that made her feel right at home. To add our own twist, we used red and green empanada discs for a fun and festive Christmas touch. The discs were store-bought.

My husband also tapped into his Puerto Rican roots and cooked up his signature beer rice with chicken, which came out delicious — as always.

And of course, no Puerto Rican-inspired meal would be complete without plantains, a staple from his childhood that paired perfectly with the rice.

We really wanted to impress Mica (and, let’s be honest, indulge our sweet tooth), so we went all out with desserts — even though we feared it might put everyone into a sugar coma by the end of the night.

We started with an apple pie, warm and buttery.

Then came the Oreo reindeer, decorated with M&Ms, gumdrops, and pretzels — cute, crunchy, and impossible to resist.

We also made a coconut cake topped with white Oreos.

And to top it all off, we created Santa skewers — pear slices for the faces, banana pieces for the white part of the hat, strawberries for the red, and marshmallows for the top. They looked so festive and disappeared so fast, I'm surprised I was able to take this photo.

Overall, the night was wonderful — filled with amazing guests, delicious food, sparkling decorations, and creative crafts that made the evening feel extra special.

And with that, our Halfway Holidays came to an end — wrapped up with a group photo, full stomachs, and hugs that lasted forever.

As of this post, we’re only a few weeks away from my husband’s 43rd birthday, which just happens to fall one day before Halloween — October 31st. As you can imagine, our large Halloween tree and spooky decorations are already up and ready for the season.

But I’ll save all that for after the scary holiday. Stay tuned — that post is going to be a scream!

Halfway to Thanksgiving: Finding Gratitude (and Turkey) in Argentina

After celebrating Halloween in May, our Halfway Holidays continued with Thanksgiving in June. Although the issues with our tenants had certainly been a nightmare, we still had a lot to be thankful for. For one thing, we had a roof over our heads, plenty of food, and — most importantly — our friend Melisa.

This year, we started a new tradition: using a smaller holiday tree and giving it a makeover that reflects whichever holiday we’re celebrating. For this one, we decorated it with artificial leaves instead of ornaments and recycled our Halloween Jack-O’-Lanterns by turning them into regular pumpkins — a perfect symbol of Thanksgiving and the fall season back home.

Of course, the biggest thing about Thanksgiving is the food, especially the turkey. That said, finding turkey in Córdoba City, Argentina, can be a real challenge. Last year, during real Thanksgiving, we had to make do with a store-bought rotisserie chicken. This year, though, we were determined to go all out for our Halfway to Thanksgiving celebration.

Admittedly, prepping the turkey was… an adventure. We forgot to thaw it until the night before. (Rookie mistake!) The next morning turned into a full-blown wrestling match between me, a frozen bird, and a bag of frozen giblets that refused to come out. I swear, I nearly got frostbite trying to free that thing. It took me over an hour — but once that bag was out, we seasoned the turkey, crossed our fingers, and popped it into our electric oven.

We had no idea how it was going to turn out. It was our first time using an electric oven — our trusty gas one is currently broken — so there was a bit of nervous anticipation in the air. About six and a half hours later, we finally pulled the turkey out. Even though carving is traditionally done at the table, we decided to slice into it early, just to make sure it was fully cooked.

To our relief… it was perfect! Juicy, golden, and everything we’d hoped for. We transferred it onto our decorative holiday platter and began setting up the rest of the feast.

In addition to the turkey, we had:

Mashed potatoes!

Stuffing!

Corn!

Mac and cheese (yes, straight from the Kraft box — a true lifesaver!)

And, of course, gravy to tie everything together.

The table was finally set — just in time for our friend Melisa to arrive and join the celebration.

With our family so far away, it’s become so important to surround ourselves with good, reliable, and non-toxic friends we can share these moments with.

And yes… before you ask — the turkey sitting on my husband’s stomach, the one on the plate, and the leaves above our heads were all added later. We used the leaves to cover the rather tragic state of our ceiling (thanks, humidity). I promise I’ll get it fixed… someday.

Before we ended the night, we set up our dessert table in front of our “Thanksgiving tree.” Some of the treats included pudding cups, pumpkin muffins, and a plate of Oreos given a festive turkey makeover.

Now, you’re probably asking yourself where the pies were — because no Thanksgiving is complete without pie. Well… let’s just say that after wrestling that turkey all day, the thought of making two pies (pumpkin and apple) felt like running a marathon. We decided to skip them this time and promised ourselves we’d make them ahead of time when real Thanksgiving rolls around in November.

With Halfway to Thanksgiving officially wrapped up, we immediately began planning our next Halfway Holiday — Christmas in July.

I’ll tell you all about that one in my next post!

Spooky Season in May? Our Halfway to Halloween Tradition Lives On!

I know I’m extremely late with this post. I should have written it months ago, but with all the craziness that’s been plaguing my life recently, I figured it was time to focus on something fun — a little reminder of the good moments we’ve had over the past couple of months.

Over the years, we’ve started a little tradition we call the “Halfway Holidays.” Basically, we celebrate Halloween in May, Thanksgiving in June, and Christmas in July. Why? Because it lets us enjoy all those cozy, comfort-heavy meals that make more sense during colder months.

For those who don’t know, fall and winter hit around these months here, unlike back home where fall begins in September. So instead of turning our kitchen into a sauna during the Argentine spring and summer (October, November, and December), we do our heavy cooking when it’s nice and cool outside.

So, let me start with our Halfway to Halloween celebration back in May.

Pizza is, of course, our biggest safety net when we don’t feel like cooking. Luckily, we discovered this amazing pizza place here in Córdoba called Dom that offers styles that aren’t your typical Argentine pizzas. I highly recommend them — they’ve become our go-to comfort food.

We also made a pumpkin pie from scratch, using cinnamon to create the eyes and mouth. And if you think it looked good on the outside, let me tell you — it looked even better on the inside, and it tasted fantastic!

In addition to pie and other finger foods...

We decided to make a pumpkin cake using the leftover pumpkin purée. The cake itself didn’t look particularly menacing… until we added a Facehugger from Aliens popping out of the top. Suddenly, dessert became a little more dangerous! Jokes aside, it was absolutely delicious.

But wait — we weren’t done baking yet! Alongside the pumpkin pie and pumpkin cake, we also made an apple pie with claw marks across the top. Because, you know, Halloween isn’t Halloween without something spooky.

Of course, no Halloween celebration is complete without pumpkin carving. Unfortunately, we couldn’t find the classic round pumpkins this year, so we had to improvise with other varieties. The good thing is that we used every bit of them — the inside for our pie filling and cake mix, and the outside for carving fun designs.

Our friend Melisa carved one that looked like a bat — though I’ll admit, I initially thought it was the Batman symbol. She quickly corrected me!

My husband went with a more traditional jack-o’-lantern, complete with eyes, a mouth (a bit bucktooth, but charming), and a witch’s hat.

As for mine… well, I tried to make it scary, but it ended up looking like a cross between a clown and a blow-up doll. Definitely not what I was going for, but hey — art is subjective.

The only thing better than a wall full of masks, spooky posters, and delicious food is sharing it all with a loving partner and a beautiful friend. That’s what made our Halfway to Halloween — and later, our Halfway to Thanksgiving — so special.

Melisa also inspired us to take these photos with ceramic Jack-O’-Lanterns covering our faces. Honestly, they turned out amazing — weirdly artsy and perfectly on theme.

Before the night ended, we decided to recreate a scene from The Strangers. I played the part of the unconscious victim about to meet their end. Let’s just say we might have missed our calling in horror cinema.

Despite all the stress and chaos we’ve had this year, we always find a way to come together and have a good time. Traditions like these remind me that even when life gets hectic, there’s always room for creativity, laughter, and pie — lots of pie.

And since real Halloween is now less than a month away, we’re already planning our next spooky adventure.

But first, stay tuned… because in my next post, I’ll tell you how we celebrated our Halfway to Thanksgiving.