Adventures of The Mouse House Crew: 40th Party

Thursday, July 7, 2011

40th Party

Aww this is a cute post. I just celebrated my 4oth and I am not a big birthday person. This actually looks fun. Can I have a do over? lol

Oh well I had a good birthday week. I say week because my friends and family decided they all wanted to take me out and feed me. It was so sweet of everyone. I felt really blessed.

Taken from "I'm an Organizing Junkie" -

40th Birthday Ugly Dress Party!!

So this year, in honor of my 40th birthday, I decided to take matters into my own hands and throw myself a birthday party. I don't think I've ever thrown a party for myself before but I figured why not! Taking notes from the Homebased Mom who throws such stunning parties, I knew a theme party was the easiest way to go. I decided on an Ugly Dress Party and was so happy I did. The party was a fabulous success! In this post I will share some of the details of the party with you along with the resources I used to pull it all together. Hang in there, this is probably the longest post I've ever written :)

First, let's start with the invitation.

Etsy really came to my aid for this party. The invitation printable above was purchased from Lora Lang Designs for $12.50. All I had to do was supply my information and then print out the number I needed. So easy! Here's a picture of the Etsy sample.

Next I had to think about decorations. The invitation helped me decide on my pink/black color theme and I continued with these colors throughout the decor.

I also purchased this adorable banner printable below from M. Bradley Designs on Etsy. Again all I had to do was print, cut and tie them all together with some black ribbon. Anyone can do it!

I hung the banner above my food station.

I also made these easy tissue paper pom-poms from Martha Stewart that really added some fun to the tables and countertops. Believe me, if I can do it, anyone can!!

The second banner you see in the above picture was a FREE printable I found online from a site called Catch My Party. So cute!

For food you can see the adorable Pink Lemonade Cupcakes my daughter made for me. They were so good. I purchased the sweet dress printable cupcake toppers and matching printable floral cupcake wrappers from Etsy as well. Gotta love Etsy!!

My food station was a small second table set up in my dining room. I made a few things but also asked each guest to bring a small appetizer to share.

As you can see no party is complete without my favorite ketchup chips :)

A sign for the table made for me by my daughter:

My mini crockpot (seriously how cute is that!) was perfect for yummy Hot Crab Dip.

Beside the food station, I set up a beverage station so guests could help themselves. Easier all around. I purchased my beverage server from Costco for $17.00…sweet!

The Strawberry Spritzer I made was absolutely delicious and was only three ingredients!! I also had a few other things on hand for variety.

After everyone got to the party I started with a game of Spoons. This is one of my very favorite games to play and I knew it would be a great ice breaker. It definitely was! We played six people at a time and the "loser" of each round was replaced by someone new until we were down to two. Such fun!

Those that weren't playing spoons entertained themselves by trying to guess the year on some old pictures of me. Feel free to have a good laugh at my expense :) For friends that haven't known me that long in my new town, I was very impressed with the winner getting 7 out of 12!

My daughter made up cute cards for everyone to mark their guesses.

Here is a FREE printable for you to use if you'd like.

Download free printable Guess the Year Voting Cards

My daughter also made cards for everyone to vote for who they thought came in the ugliest dress.

Another free printable for you:

Download free printable Ugly Dress Party Voting Cards

Now for the ugly dresses!

Here I am in all my ugly dress glory. Seriously you had to feel the polyester awesomeness of this dress to really appreciate the ugliness of this dress. I was HOT and NOT in an ooh la la kind of way if you know what I mean.

There were some really ugly dresses at this party. Here is just a quick peek:

Old shiny bridesmaid dress:

A lovely floral ensemble. Again you had to feel this material to appreciate it.

A chilly pepper dress with a giant matching bow. Yikes! I thought she'd win for sure.

However the Ugliest Dress Award for 2011 went to this "beautiful" dress below complete with chicken buttons.

Don't you think every dress needs some chicken buttons…hahaha!

I had made up gift baskets for both the Can You Guess the Year and Ugliest Dress winners. Both baskets included my book which I thought was a nice touch (ha!) with a whole other slew of fun goodies! You can see the gift baskets on the table behind me in this picture but unfortunately I forgot to take close up shots.