A Holiday Entertaining Tip for the Lazy Hostess

*This post is part of a social shopper marketing insight campaign with Pollinate Media Group™ and Cottonelle, but all my opinions are my own. #pmedia #CottonelleHoliday http://cmp.ly/3/8vNxcO.

Ok so maybe I am not totally a lazy entertainer.  But I much prefer the pre-party planning to the actual hosting of the party.  I love to peruse magazines for food inspiration.  I make list after list of the things I need to purchase or craft.  Often this can be accompanied by a cocktail.  Perhaps it is one that I am doing a test run of for said party.  Perhaps not.  Don’t judge.  I like all things party planning.  I tolerate set up (as long as things run smoothly) but by the time the guests arrive, I’m pretty well over the whole thing and ready to move on to the next one.  I still want to make sure that my guests are taken care of, I just don’t want to have to only focus on that all night long.  I mean, what good is having all those yummy appetizers if you don’t have the time to enjoy some of them yourself?

One thing I ALWAYS forget to do is check the bathroom throughout the party to ensure that my guests are taken care of in the toilet paper department.  Somehow that always falls through the party execution cracks.  And there is nothing more embarrassing for you or your guests than to have to have that awkward discussion about where the extra rolls are.  Talk about a buzz kill.  I’m trying to enjoy my delicious spiced cranberry cocktail and now someone wants me to traipse through the house with toilet paper?  Classy.  But I draw the line at plopping a package in the bathroom.  Hot tip: Find Cottonelle‘s Triple Rolls.  Yes, you read that right.  Triple Rolls.  I picked mine up at Target.  They even have a coupon right now for a free box of Kleenex tissue (another party staple) with the purchase of the Cottonelle Triple Roll 12 pack or larger (While supplies last).  While the package is nice looking, I still don’t want to just leave it sitting out.

So I decided to stack extra rolls in to the shape of a Christmas tree.  Cute, right?  I mean if you are going to leave a bunch of toilet paper out in the bathroom, you might as well try to theme it.  And remember these are triple rolls.  If you need more than  6 extra rolls something is probably terribly wrong and you should seek medical attention for your guests.

And to take it one step further.  I used a holiday stamp, created by Lauren, to add a little bit of holiday spirit to the rolls.  I hate when people use ink to customize napkins and things that quite clearly you will be using to clean up with.  I don’t want to rub ink all over my face.  That being said, if you stamp on the very first square on the roll, it won’t be too wasteful for your guests to just remove it prior to use.  Or else it will get wadded up and not get ink, you know, anywhere.

Now that you have the bathroom covered, the other trick I have to share is to set out dishes of holiday candy (some nostalgic, some modern) around the party.  That way if you run out of food (because I never remember to check that either), there are little things for the guests to nibble on.  And when people have something in their mouths they are less likely to complain.