Take a Break From Holiday Prepwork and Go Back To School

While the holiday season is meant to be a time for merriment, many find this time of year extremely stressful, between organizing events, shopping for gifts, and all the planning it takes to execute the perfect holiday.

Something you may have not considered doing this time of year: taking a class.

Brooklyn Brainery, on 515 Court Street, offers classes based on suggestions from the community. And by December, the classes start to take on a holiday tone.

“Around this time of year, you are totally bombarded with parties,” said Jen Messier from Brooklyn Brainery. “But maybe you want something a little deeper.”

Known for teaching an enormous variety of topics, Brooklyn Brainery’s classes range from the origin of capitalism to applying zombie make-up. Of course, their take on the holiday season is sure to be equally bizarre and intriguing. Current classes include Winter Cocktails: Hot Drinks for Cold Nights, DIY Gifts for Your Foodie Friends, Latkes!, How to Tell an Amazing Tale, A “Very Special” Holiday Wine Tasting, and A Brief History of Christmas Traditions. Several of the classes meet only once, and students can walk away with a viable skill to include in their holiday preparations.

“It is a social outlet,” said Messier, noting that around this time of year the classes are meant to be casual. In the cooking class about latkes, for instance, students can look forward to eating latkes and apple sauce and playing games of dreidel.

“It can be a get-together, but you can also be learning something or picking up a valuable skill,” Messier said. 

The lecture classes, such as A Brief History of Christmas Traditions, can get you into a holiday mood, and you might walk away with a different perspective.

“It’s interesting to get the back story of things that you totally take for granted,” said Messier.

And if the mental challenges don’t get your mind off the stress of the season, than perhaps some soothing, repetitive motions will.

“It serves the purpose of getting you out of the house and away from the craziness that’s going on,” Messier said. “We had a dumpling making class where everyone was saying how therapeutic it was to make dumplings over and over again.”