Invite: I kept the invite simple with a gold chain at the top and a rapper in Santa gear that I found online. Incorporated some rap slang into the wording with "fo' shizzle", crib, beat, etc. For added fun I asked guests to come dress up as a rapper with chains, etc. I loved what some of the girls came up with.
Decorations: I asked around and borrowed almost everything for my centerpiece. In the middle, I borrowed my daughter's old school stereo.
I purchased a Snoop on the Stoop to set on top of the stereo. The wooden music notes my brother made decades ago when my dad was president of Community Concerts and needed them, so I just pulled them out of my party supply bin in the garage. The gold chains I borrowed from friends & neighbors.
I purchased empty CD cases from Amazon, and then used Photoshop to create rap albums that were holiday themed. These were added to the centerpiece. The Snoop album already existed, so I didn't do anything with that beyond printing the cover. The Missy Elliott CD became Christmissy Elliott with single being "Wrap It" instead of "Work It." The Ice T album I just changed the first word "Deck (Check) Yourself Before You Wreck Yourself." The Stormzy album was "Mistletoe and Grime."
I made napkin rings to look like money rings using my Cricut machine and gold glitter cardstock.
I had a ton of fun designing my place cards. I did my best to incorporate each guest's name into an existing rapper - Missy Elliot became Mi-shell-iot for my friend Michelle for example. I found an album cover online for each artist and then used PhotoShop to replace the rapper's face with the face of my guest and the rapper's name with the creative name I came up with.
Love the will.i.am swap to jill.i.am for this one.
Just a couple more of them -- plays on Ice T and Queen Latifah became Nazlifah for my friend Nazly.
I found art prints of rap artists online, that I printed to use for wine charms.
Created these fun wine labels which is always one of my favorite things to do with each of my dinner parties. For this dinner, the chardonnay was inspired by Snoop Dogg - "Twas the Nizzle Before Christwizzle, and all through the Nizzle, We Drank Chardonnizzle." For the red wine, I used an album cover of Ice T's for the song "Big Pimpin'" and just added "Cab Sippin'" for the cabernet sauvignon.
Menu: Seriously so much fun coming up with menu items to match with famous rappers. Started with a Notorious B.R.I.E (after rapper Notorious B.I.G.) made holiday style. It was easy to make 8" round brie, one can of cranberry dressing, a few pecans, and crackers. I heated the brie for 15 minutes in a 350 degree oven, then topped it with the cranberry and a few pecans. This was a popular appetizer.
Next was a green salad I named after Queen Latifah calling it Queen La-Toss-Ah Salad. This was romaine lettuce, sliced pears, candied pecans, feta, and pomegranate seeds. The dressing was made with apple juice, maple syrup, and dijon blend. I don't normally eat pomegranate, but they were fun and festive on the salad to add the holiday flair.
We also had a Drake Your Own (build your own) baked potato with lots of fixings. I had butter, onion, cheese, chili, bacon bits, and broccoli. I called these Snoop's "Baked" Potatoes. Yummy.
Next it was shrimp skewers I called Run DMC-food. I cooked these on the stovetop in butter with Salt N Pepa! On each of my menu cards, I tried to alter a popular lyric from the artist to match the food as well,
For dessert, we had an apple crisp I called Ludapple Crisp (after rapper Ludacris). Instead of ice cream, I served it with LL Cool Whip! Super tasty dessert for sure.
Favor: As an easy favor, I made Eminem/M&M Shots. I bought plastic shot glasses from Dollar Tree and filled them with red and green holiday M&Ms. I attached a tag with a twist on a famous lyric by Eminem "Please come back...back again."
We had a great time!
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