Christmas with the stars

For this issue, our columnist Kate Hawkesby played a festive prank on hubby Mike Hosking – the “ultimate Grinch!” The couple are pictured here with Mike’s Seven Sharp co-host Toni Street.

In cahoots with Woman’s Day Editor-in-Chief Sido Kitchin and Mike’s co-presenter Toni, Kate got Mike to participate in his least favourite thing – a decidedly Christmassy photo shoot, complete with outrageous Christmas jumper and a giant novelty ham!

Surprisingly, the veteran broadcaster got into the spirit of the photo shoot – all as the Seven Sharp cameras were rolling!

Mike hams it up for the cameras.

“I was amazed he’d played along,” Kate writes in our Christmas issue.

Go behind the scenes of the Woman’s Day Christmas issue in the next video

The joke’s on Mike!

Christmas jumpers and reindeer ears … Kate, Mike and Toni strike a pose in their festive-themed ensembles.

Unlike Mike, however, Toni simply can’t get enough of the Christmas spirit. The mum-of-two will be hosting Christmas lunch this year, with roast lamb, turkey and trifle, before heading off to the Coromandel for a well-earned break.

The 33-year-old broadcasting star, who is mum to Juliette, four, and one-year-old Mackenzie, vividly remembers her best-ever present as a child. Blindfolded with a tea towel, five-year-old Toni was led outside on Christmas morning to find a playhouse built especially for her by dad Geoff. “I was totally blown away,” she recalls. “It was two-storeyed and had ‘Toni’s Place’ written on the side and a big bunny.”

Stylist Victoria pulls out another festive option for Mike.

You’ve been punked! Toni revealed the Seven Sharp cameras had been rolling the whole time.

“I am a Christmas junkie. I love the fairy lights, the festivity, the feasting, but most of all, I love the looks on my children’s faces when they wake up to the magic of Christmas morning,” Kate reveals.

Bachelor star Naz Khanjani plans to spend Christmas in Canada with her dad and his new wife.

“I’m so excited to get on that plane! It’s been such a crazy year and I really need a break. I can’t wait to meet my stepmum and sister – I’m getting new family members for Christmas!” she says.

Originally set to take her beau Craig Sutherland along, a heartbroken Naz, 26, called time on the romance last month after a series of blazing rows. “It’s been horrible and not how I imagined things would turn out. but I”m not going to sit around moping. It’s his loss!” she says.

All reality TV star Jordan Mauger really wants for Christmas is love – and it sounds like he might be in luck! “There’s only one thing on my wish list and that’s the person I’ll be spending Christmas with,” he says with a cheeky smile. The Bachelor NZ hunk introduced the nation to his new love Gina exclusively in Woman’s Day.

This year, the assistant film director is foregoing a family Christmas for a tropical holiday in Thailand.

Jordan, 33, has always been a sucker for the festive season. As a boy, he would start the countdown months out, revelling in the magic and excitement.

“Nothing beats a Kiwi summer, but the adventurer in me needs to get away! I’ll miss my dad’s legendary turkey, though. He does it on the barbecue and it’s incredible,” he says.

Celebrity foodie Nadia Lim has been with her husband Carlos Bagrie for over a decade, but this year will be only the third Christmas that they’ve spent together. “We’re just so close to our own families that we don’t like to miss Christmas with them,” she tells. But now they’re mum and dad to little Bodhi, seven months, Nadia, 30, and Carlos, 31, are bringing the families together for a big celebration at their Auckland home.

It might sound clichéd, but all Pippa Wetzell is hoping for this Christmas is for happy and healthy children. And for good reason – last year, the Fair Go host spent most of the day in Starship children’s hospital with her son Taj. “He woke up on Christmas morning and just couldn’t walk,” Pippa recalls. “I kept thinking he would come right, but I took him to A&E to be sure and they sent us straight to Starship.”

Taj, now five, was diagnosed with “irritable hip”, which soon resolved on its own, but it meant Pippa, 39 – who’s also mum to Brodie, nine, and Cameron, seven – missed her family Christmas brunch.

“It put a bit of a dampener on Christmas, but fortunately it wasn’t serious so there was no big panic or stress. And in a peculiar sort of way, enjoyed it. Taj and I spent the morning cuddled up on the bed together.

“Spending time at Starship puts things into perspective in the best possible way. You can’t help but realise how lucky you are to have happy, healthy kids.”