Vision for 2020

To usher in 2020, I decided to host my January monthly dinner with a 20/20 vision theme.  We raised our "glasses" to the new year and created "vision" boards of what we want in this upcoming year.  This was easy to decorate for and so much fun.  You might find what I did a bit "corne-a", but if you've been following my blog for a while, you know that corny is right up my alley!  Check out the details of the party & host one of your own!

Invite:  I found a background image that had lots of styles of glasses in various colors, so these colors became the colors of the party.  I created the invitation using the concept of an eye exam chart having the eye chart spell out "A Spectacular Vision for 2020 Dinner!" I tried to use words like spectacular (to go with specs) and vision to reference the theme.  Same thing with the "eye" hope to "see" you there.

I had fun decorating the table for this theme.  Lots of colorful eyeballs and glasses to create the centerpiece and place settings.

For the centerpiece, I had a sign that read "Raise your GLASSES to the new year!" with vision glasses being raised.  I also spray-painted some empty wine bottles and vases with the colors of the invite.  Then I added reading glasses to each.  To secure them on the back I used rubber bands that held them in place.  I was planning to cut a wine cork and glue it the bottle to look like a nose which would then help hold the glasses up too, but I ran out of time.  I also bought two pairs of giant glasses from Party City to add a bit of fun and use as photo props.

It was easy to make the plates look like eyeballs.  I simply printed various color irises the size to fit the inside of my white plates.

I had fun creating the place cards.  I made mini glasses out of glitter cardstock in three different styles of glasses.  These were placed in front of an eye exam chart with the guest's name and then something about them.  For me it was my name and then The Hostess. I used a eye chart creator I found online, so it had to be a specific number of letters or it would add random letters to the end.  I had to be creative with dashes or exclamation points or things to make it fit well.

Above my beverage table, I made a banner out of card stock.  I used my Cricut to cut out different styles of glasses in the same colors at the invitation.  I then attached them together with brads that were the same color as each of the glasses.

A fun sign for the wine table.

I found these cute rubber wine charms on Amazon and couldn't pass them up. They came with the black glasses wine stopper seen in the above photo as well.  The pack only came with 6, so I did use my Cricut to make a couple additional ones out of card stock for the remaining guests.

I always have fun coming up with what creative way I can represent my theme in my wine labels.  For this theme I went with an eye chart of the red wine and changed up the font color for  "SEEING RED".  The rest of the label used the same colors and images of the invitation.  The side of the label which can't be seen in the photo has an eyeball looking at a bottle of red wine.  For the white wine, I went with the saying "I love white wine" switching out the letter "I" for an eyeball.

Menu: Trying to figure out what to serve for this dinner that went with the theme was a challenge.  So many eye-related recipes I saw were geared toward Halloween or just appetizers. While some of my menu items looked like eyeballs, I went with more of a vision pun/new years vibe with my menu.  The appetizers was simple white chips and guacamole. I tried to arrange the chips to be the white of the eye, the guacamole the iris, and cut up black olives for the pupil.

As I mentioned, the menu cards gave a recommendation or wish for 2020 with some sort of silly pun.  "Don't rub avocados on your eyes; you could get Guacoma" was this one.

For the main dish, I made meatballs to look like eyeballs. After making a thumbprint divot in the meatball, I put a teaspoon of pasta sauce, then a bit of a mozzarella ball, and topped it with a slice of black olive.

After they were cooked, I put two meatballs on a bed of spaetzle (a German pasta).  The menu card for these read "Make a SPEC-tzle of yourself.  Be more than MEATS the eye".

A side dish was corn as I reminded guests to make their jokes the CORN-ea the better in 2020!

For dessert I made new years festive cupcakes in black and white with silver glitter sprinkles.  I added glasses cupcake toppers I made using my Cricut.  The cupcake menu card asked guests in 2020 to "See Cupcakes as pieces of EYE candy."

Favors:  How cute are these chocolate glasses?  I bought this chocolate mold forever ago for an 80s party, but it went perfect with this theme as well.  It took some time to make these because of the color changes, but I love how they turned out.  I created another eye chart for the tag that read "Eye see great things for you in 2020."

Activity:  Since this was a happy new year party paired with a 20/20 vision as a theme, I set up a station for guests to create vision boards for 2020.  Magazines, scissors, glue sticks, and 12x12 cardstock made for a simple activity.  This was an easy activity to do while chatting, and a fun way to "focus" on the year ahead.

Thanks for reading!  EYE hope you enVISION a 2020 that is PERFECT!