Sunday, April 18, 2021

Soul Movie Monthly Dinner

 

I really enjoyed Pixar's new movie Soul.  It was a cute movie, and it made for a fun family movie night.  I decided to use this movie as inspiration for our April monthly dinner.


Invite:
  I used the Soul movie poster as background for the invitation, so I went with blues, whites, and yellows as the color scheme.  We did this dinner on Zoom again as we wait for everyone to be vaccinated.  I would host it outdoors at my house, but we are currently redoing our backyard, and it is a disaster zone of construction.  Hopefully in the future we will be back to in person dinners.

Party Details:  Some of these party details you won't understand unless you have seen the movie, but many of the party details are iconic parts or references.  The premise of the movie is a man named Joe Garder who is a middle school band teacher, but wishes to be a famous jazz musician.  Right as he is about to get his big break into the music business, he accidently falls into a manhole and his "soul" is separated from his body.  The adventure continues from there.


Joe Gardner is a piano player, and he has great passion for Jazz music.  I created piano napkins to represent this passion.  I bought plain white napkins and then used my Cricut to make the keys.


For my wine labels, I played off some popular quotes and symbols from the movie that stood out to me when I watched it.  In the movie, all souls start in the "Great Before" where they must earn/discover passions to fill their badge spots.  When they find their "spark" the badge is complete and changes into an Earth Pass which enables them to start their lives on Earth.  To play off this concept for my red white label, I created the blank badge and filled it with images of wine and wine bottles.  I added the words "Wine...definitely my Spark!"


Also in the movie is a character named Terry that counts souls to send on to the "Great Beyond."  In the movie, Terry is obsessed with the count and when this count is thrown off by Joe's escape, he is desperate to set it right.  For the white wine labels,  I created an abacus like the one used in the movie for counting souls, but changed the dots to white wine glasses.  I used Terry's line from the movie "Umm...That's weird. The count is off" and then added "Guess I'll have another glass" to the the wine label.


Menu:
  You could definitely serve soul food for this theme, but I went with a easier menu.  New York pizza plays a role in the movie for it's taste and smell as one of the characters, 22, comes to Earth for the first time.  I decided to make individual pizzas for each of my guests.  Guests had the option of toppings: pepperoni, sausage, green pepper, mushrooms, olives, and mozzarella cheese. 


You can order pizza boxes off of Amazon.  The ones I ordered ended up being too small, but I went to a local pizza parlor near my house, and they were kind enough to give me 8" pizza boxes which was perfect.  I designed a label for the front of the box with the pizza parlor scene from the movie.  I chose to incorporate one quote from the movie "You can't eat dreams for breakfast," and then I added "but you can eat pizza."


I also served a green salad with grape tomatoes, feta, bacon, egg, and sunflower seeds.  This was my "sign-spinning salad" after the Moonwind character in the movie.  I find this character hilarious, and love that when he is on Earth, he is a sign-spinner for a store - 50% off Everything!  I used PhotoShop to create a image of Moonwind for the top of the salad container and made a sign (50% off Salads) that I attached with a brad, so it could spin around.  Just a little fun detail.


For dessert, I made meringue cookies with chocolate chips.  I added a tiny bit of teal food coloring to the mixture before baking to have it be the color of the "Great Before" and the souls in that realm.  These are tasty and super easy, so it was a good fit.


Again, the tag was made on PhotoShop. I included the line from the movie, "You're really great at jazzing," but added "and friendship and eating dessert" to match with my menu and theme.


Favor: 
When the character 22 is on Earth, she begins to collect things that have meaning to her and make sure smile.  I packaged some of these things for the favor.  I gave guests a mini bagel and a red tootsie pop which are two of these items.  I also took an empty spool of thread and made a yarn tag around it.  This is another item that helped 22 find her spark while on Earth.  The tag read "Your Friendship is my Spark and Purpose" just to use some of the language of the movie.

This theme was fun and would be great for a viewing party or birthday party.  All was easy to make and yummy to eat! Nights with my friends fills my "Soul" and this was another great dinner.