Author: empadmin

I hope the Christmas season is finding you well and blessed with the gifts of family-time and peace.  Of course, the end of Christmas does not signify the end of gatherings and parties, because we still have New Year’s Eve.

Now, most of my friends that know me well find this surprising, but I personally prefer to keep New Year’s Eve small and intimate. What better way to ring in the New Year Year than with close family and friends?  This coming New Year represents several new chapters in our lives—I completed my bachelor’s degree (one of my biggest regrets in life was not finishing school), my youngest graduates high school and she just performed her last Nutcracker ballet.)  Now, more than ever I want this New Year’s Eve to be filled with family and friends.

Sometimes, New Year’s Eve can be a bit of an afterthought, especially if you are busy with Christmas festivities. So, it’s necessary that you plan ahead.

First, it is absolutely imperative to plan your party music ahead of time.  So many times I have been to parties that the food was great, the company was great, the setting was great, but the music….blah.  Music really sets the tone for any gathering.  Think about it, music and feelings go hand-in-hand.  New Year’s Eve is supposed to be fun, lighthearted, and a celebration—your music should reflect that.  One idea for music is to play hit songs decade by decade:  start with the sixties and work up to now.

Food selections can be simple or elaborate for New Year’s Eve.  You could do a dessert only menu.

How about a banana-split bar including ice cream, hot fudge, and lots of homemade whipped cream?  You can also go retro and serve things your mother used to put out when she had parties back in the day, like sour cream and onion soup dip and baked pineapple chunks wrapped in bacon.   

New Year’s Eve decorating is really easy since you already have your home decorated for the holidays.  I simply revamp some of the holiday décor. When I think of New Year’s Eve I think of glitzy, so I focus on glittered items like glittered pinecones and lots of silver!  I remove things like Santas and rework arrangements to reflect the occasion. I leave the tree and stairwell garland and take off all the ornaments except silver and gold, then add party horns, New Year’s Eve-themed decorations and a banner with the New Year.

Photo credit:  www.diyinspired.com

 

You will also want to set up a simple photo area with props for your friends. This is perhaps one of the best things you can do, because the pictures and memories will last a lifetime.

The New Year is a time for reflection as well as an opportunity to welcome change and exciting things to come.

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After nearly a decade of Nutcracker performances and rehearsals, this is my daughter’s final Nutcracker. It’s hard to believe that this is it. To say that I’m a little sad is an understatement. Next year will be very different for me because we won’t be listening to Nutcracker music in September, anxiously awaiting casting, spending every week at the dance studio nor scheduling all of our Christmas activities around Nutcracker performances. To some that may seem like misery, but to us it’s just a part of the holiday season.  One of Western Arkansas Ballet’s Nutcracker traditions I’m going to miss is the annual Clara party. You see, whomever is cast as Clara that year hosts a Clara party for the rest of the cast. It’s a tradition that the dancers look forward to every season.  Not a ballerina? No problem! You can host your very own Clara party this Christmas season!

The Nutcracker has a whimsical and magic feeling about it and that should show through in your Clara party. One of the best ways to accomplish this is to use non-traditional Christmas colors. Take cues from the performance itself. Think of Act 2 and the Land of Sweets. Colors like pastel pinks, blues, and mint green come to mind. Oh, and sparkly, you can’t forget the sparkles! Snowflakes make a great decoration for a Clara party to represent the Dream Scene in Act 1.

Set the scene with a backdrop to feature your food table.

This pink velvet curtain, like this one from Catch My Party is perfect for any Clara.  If you don’t have an extra pink velvet curtain laying around, no worries. You can make a backdrop from crepe paper and paper fans like this one from www.somethingturquoise.com. 

In this particular picture they used velvet ribbon streamers, which can get a bit pricey, so crepe paper is a good alternative. You can purchase all sorts of paper fans and crepe paper at The Party Place!

Stick with Nutcracker-themed food for the perfect Clara party. Things like these cute little Mouse King Bites 

Snowflake Pretzels 

and chocolate-covered strawberries 

are the perfect stars of the show!

Of course, you can’t forget the nutcrackers! Use nutcrackers to match your party colors.

When I host a kid’s party I always like to have a little craft for them to keep them occupied and keep them from getting restless. There are lots of craft ideas on www.rainydaymum.co.uk/nutcracker-crafts-activities-kids/.

A Clara party is a perfect Sunday afternoon get-together or a wonderful way to gather and celebrate before attending the Nutcracker performance.

 

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A couple of weeks ago, we hosted my youngest daughter’s last Halloween party. To say that I’m sad is an understatement. We’ve hosted a Halloween party since she was in Pre-K. Yes, there were many years that I thought to myself, “Why in the world did I start this tradition?” but in the end I am ever so glad that we continued it. Parents of young children, heck, even older children, I strongly urge you to start some sort of tradition with your kids. Now, it doesn’t have to be a party, it can be anything, just something that they look forward to every year and that they will look back on as a good memory. I promise you that you won’t regret it.

Grayson has always loved Charlie Brown, so she really wanted to do a “The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” party.

This party theme was actually pretty easy to pull off with minimal costs. Of course, it started with the invitation that was Charlie Brown themed.

We opted to do a dinner and movie kind of thing. You guessed, it the movie was “The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.” We set up our projector and outdoor screen and lots of blankets. The outdoor screen was made of PVC pipe and a white king-sized bedsheet. We found the directions on Pinterest. Click the link to build your own outdoor movie screen. The only thing we did different was the bed sheet rather than purchasing the material for the screen. 

Grayson had a whole vision for this outdoor movie night. She wanted café lights for the lighting, so I ordered a few boxes and we strung them near the movie area. Just an FYI, I try to make or repurpose as many things as I can, but when I do have to purchase things, I try to make the purchase count, like the café lights. I know without a doubt that they are something I will reuse over and over again. For example, I know we will use them at our Friendsgiving celebration.

For the dinner, we served chili, a veggie tray, and other small finger foods. During the movie, we set up a popcorn bar. Guests were able to scoop their popcorn and add whatever they wanted like candy corn, M&M’s and pretzels. That was a big hit! 

Also, Grayson made a Charlie Brown-themed banner for photos.

She did this with Linus picture she enlarged on the printer, cut out stars from her Silhouette and a twin-sized bedsheet.

The party was a big hit and the weather was perfect. I couldn’t have asked for anything better for her last party.

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Since my youngest started kindergarten, we’ve had a Halloween party. Actually, the Halloween party tradition started when she was in Pre-K in Florida. You see, we lived in Pensacola when Hurricane Ivan hit. Our property had minimal damage unlike many of our friends that lost nearly everything. I’m not sure if you’ve ever lived some place that a major disaster has occurred, but just the daily sight of debris strewn about and the constant reminder of pure devastation grows tiresomeness both mentally and physically. I wanted to offer some kind of normalcy to the neighborhood and the girls’ school friends, so we had a Halloween party! The kids dressed up, we had a parade and played lots of games. Now today, my youngest is a senior, so sadly this will be our last Halloween party (until I get grandkids J). I can honestly say that we’ve had just about every Halloween party theme you can think of. We’ve had a carnival, scavenger hunts, a Halloween parade, a mystery party, you name it, we’ve done it in the past 13 years.

I think my favorite party we ever hosted was a scavenger hunt in downtown Fort Smith, Arkansas. We utilized the Fort Smith National Historic site and the Ross Pendergraft Park. This one did take a bit of preplanning, as I had to go to the park beforehand to snap photos of various landmarks and locations for scavenger hunt items. I spent a few weeks gathering scavenger hunt items like eyeballs, fangs, skeletons, skulls, etc. I made a list of the scavenger hunt items and matched them with the photos that I thought would make the best clue, For instance,

“Find a garden that once belonged to the officers.  Some of the officers lost their hands.  You could probably use a helping hand, so be sure to pick one up.”

This clue was at the old Officer’s Garden and they had to find a hand.  Another clue was a cut up photo of this building and they had to put it together to reveal the location of their next clue. Here’s the most challenging part, we had 30 kids and that meant five different teams. You can’t have 30 kids all going to the same clues because they end up just following one another.  To solve this problem, I made five separate lists and arranged the order of the clues for each team, then sealed each clue in an envelope (I had something like 100 envelopes of clues) with the team number and clue number written on the outside.  Therefore, I would leave the item they were to pick up at the location and then leave the clue to the next location.  Each team got the same Clue #1 where they picked up a bag, a pencil, and their next clue.  It took my husband and me about an hour and half to set the scavenger hunt. 

To build excitement before the party, we made a series of invitations. After a week or so, we sent out a book of requirements that gave all the rules and revealed a few more details about the part without disclosing the location.

. Finally, the invitations were delivered in person as the original invitation stated. Since all the other details were given previously except the location, we chose to give glow-in-the-dark rubber ducks with the location attached.

Although there is a bit of initial legwork once, the kids get there the party pretty much runs itself. There is nothing worse than 30 sugar-hyped kids and not having enough planned for them to stay busy for two hours!

We kept the food simple since it was a 2:00 pm party.  We had easy finger foods like cupcakes, cookies, a veggie tray and chips and dip. Although the pavilion is beautiful, I wanted to jazz it up a bit to go with the theme, so I opted to use purple and black versus the traditional orange and black decorations.

For a photo booth, I used an oversized wooden frame equipped with props for the kids.

We hosted this party about three years ago and my daughter still says that is her all-time favorite! You can easily scale this party down if you would like, you can host it

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I love all of the little popup shops “popping” up everywhere, but what I love even more is a popup party! A popup party is a fun little party that you decide to have at the last minute, especially during the summer months when schedules have a bit more flexibility. Sometimes, I think the little impromptu parties are the best kind, because there’s not so much “stuff” to get worked up about. You know stuff like every detail down to the placement of the napkins. Now don’t get me wrong, I love a well thought out and detailed event just as much as the next person and can certainly appreciate the time and effort that goes into something like that, but sometimes it’s nice to just free ourselves of too much fuss and just relax. I think that’s why a fun-little popup party is so enjoyable. It’s carefree and easy, leaving more time to enjoy friends and family. Now, in order to accomplish this little soiree you will need a tiny bit of pre-planning that consists of what I like to call a Party To-Go Basket. 

Here’s what you need to complete your very own Party To-Go Basket:

• Clear plates and cups: You can never go wrong with clear. I think they look nice for casual or nicer events. They’re sturdy and they match anything. I keep two sizes of plates on hand—dessert and dinner. For cups, I like the nine-ounce size because they’re not too big or too small. They’re also a good size for serving wine.
• Faux “real” silverware: These plastic beauties have to rank as one of the best modern inventions in a while. They look nice and jazz up any event. You can barely tell the difference between them and the real thing.
• Colorful, yet neutral napkins: Always keep a selection of napkins on hand. Something like a burlap, black and white damask, plain white and fresh mint are good choices to add color yet stay neutral.
• Two white tablecloths: White tablecloths are a great foundation to build on for any table setting. You can layer them with burlap, fabric, table runners or make a pineapple runner as shown in the cover photo from www.avso.org, the possibilities are endless. It’s better to have more than two, but two will get you started. I prefer to use real cloth even for casual events, but I also like to keep a few plastic table covers in white and black on hand as well.
• Candles: White tealights are the perfect addition to any party.
• Mason jars: Keep several in your basket handy and ready to be filled with silverware, flowers, candles or whatever else you can imagine.
• Small baskets and doilies: You can use these for a multitude of things like holding chips and crackers. Simply transferring a bag of chips to a basket makes a world of difference even if it is a casual party.  

I’m sure you’ve noticed by now that the overall theme for the basket is plain and neutral. You can add a splash of color with fresh flowers, balloons and party decorations. As your basket grows, add a few colorful party decorations. For example, anything patriotic works great from Memorial Day through Labor Day. Oh, who am I kidding patriotism is good for any time of the year!

Now that your basket is complete, you’re all set. All you need to do is add music and friends.

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I’m just going to go ahead and admit this…I’m guilty of indulging in shows like The Real Housewives of…oh, it doesn’t matter what city, I’ll watch it and Southern Charm. Mindless television is my guilty pleasure that I like to use to decompress from a long day.  I did, however, learn something useful from Southern Charm.  During one of the episodes, they hosted a “sip and see”. I thought to myself, “What a great idea!”  Maybe you’ve heard of it or attended one before. This is a wonderful way for couples to host a party to let everyone see their new bundle of joy.  

The parents, family members or friends host a sip and see. The best part is that it’s on the parents’ terms when they are feeling up to having visitors. I can remember being a new parent and in the beginning it was hard to get acclimated to feeding schedules, no sleep and most days I wasn’t really feeling up to having a lot of visitors (especially since I found taking a shower to be challenging in the beginning). The sip and see is ideal, because well-wishers know they will have an opportunity to see baby without surprising the new parents.  Another advantage is it helps take the attention off mommy and onto the new baby. I don’t know about you, but I always felt a little awkward about being the center of attention at one of my baby showers especially since I had gained 70 pounds with my one! To say that I wasn’t feeling like myself was an understatement. The sip and see is perfect because mommy decides when she feels her best for visitors.

What exactly do you do at a sip and see? Well, you literally sip and see the baby. Guests have a drink. Something like champagne is appropriate or whatever you choose to serve and check out the new baby. The best part is you don’t have to plan any baby shower games.

So you’ve decided to host a sip and see. Now what? Once you’ve decided on a day and time. You’ll need to send out invitations. Something like this cute invitation with a champagne glass and baby bottle. 

Next up is deciding on what you’ll serve guests. Remember, the time of day determines the scale of food you need to serve. If you’re hosting a morning event, say around 11:00 am it is customary to serve brunch. If you’re hosting at 2:00 pm you can get by with serving light snacks and anything after 5:00 pm you should consider serving heavy hors devours or dinner. A sip and see is typically less fussy and is considered more of a come and go kind of thing. Think of it in terms of an open house.

Now comes my favorite part….decorations!  The whole idea of a sip and see is to keep it casual and relaxing so if you’re not really into a lot of decorations this is perfect for you. You don’t even have to decorate if you don’t want to, but I like to add my own little extra something special.

• For any gathering, a mimosa bar is fun and adds a little pizazz to any event. This is easy to accomplish and looks amazing. I also love it as it works twofold, because it doubles for people that drink alcohol and the people that don’t. Display your selection of juices in pretty containers, fruit selections in bowls and then add champagne bottles. This allows guests to drink with or without alcohol and allows them to control the amount of alcohol in their drink. This mimosa bar is the perfect backdrop for any party.

 

• To create this look you’ll need crepe paper streamers and paper lanterns. Plastic champagne glasses are an excellent alternative to the real deal and helps to avoid doing dishes all night.

 

 

 

 

 

 

• A great way to utilize balloons is this cute “Hello baby” backdrop.

• Set out framed newborn pictures for guests to see.

• Set up a table with notecards and pens for guests to leave personal notes to the baby. After the party, place the notecards in a shadow box for a baby keepsake. 

Don’t forget to set up a gift table even if you’ve requested no gifts many people will want to bring something. Typically, at a sip and see gifts are opened after the guests leave. 

Of course, you’ll want to have a camera handy to snap pictures with your guests and baby.

The absolute most important thing to remember about a sip and see is to relax and celebrate your beautiful new addition to your family with friends and family.

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