We had so much fun at our July monthly dinner. It was an Oops...Wrong Party theme. For this theme, you basically pick a party (Halloween, birthday, etc.), and come dressed up for that party! I asked all the guests to RSVP with the "party" they would come dressed as (just to avoid duplicates), and it was super fun. We had ladies ready for a Halloween party, a pool party, Octoberfest, etc. I dressed for a Search Party with a neon safety jacket, flashlight, and a missing person poster complete with photo of the one friend that was unable to attend our festivities!
Invite: I designed the invite with clipart images of various parties - ugly sweater, pajama, graduation, toga, disco, etc. Other than these I kept the invite text simple.
Decorations: I pulled out of few of the many holiday decorations I own for this dinner. I didn't have to buy anything as I already had most everything. At the front door, I had a Halloween pumpkin bucket, my Santa happy holidays sign, and my 4th of July sign I already had up from the weekend. I lined my mantle with various party-related items and mixed up holiday banners throughout the party area.
For the main table centerpiece, I set out decorations like a table runner. These included a graduation plate with grad announcements from two of my guest's children, a witch hat/candle/sign, a disco ball, Santa/wrapped present/bell wreath, birthday hat/glasses, football jersey/football, 4th of July hat/flags, and a mascarade mask.
I mixed up my napkins too which took some creativity. My mom keeps everything, so I went through her napkin stash to find some holiday napkins. I created the others with various ribbon from my own staff and just items I could find around my house to dress them up.
The wine labels I designed for this party were based on a Retirement Party (off the clock cabernet) and Super Bowl Party (championship chardonnay).
To keep it easy for the wine charms, I printed out logos representing various parties and taped them to the front of the glass stems.
Menu: I had so much fun coming up with a menu for this dinner! The possibilities are endless! Personally, I decided to design menu items for parties that guests were NOT coming dressed as just to keep the variety, but if you have a bigger guest list, that might not be possible. For the appetizer, I borrowed my mom's Haviland tea cups and saucers and made individual charcuterie cups for each guest. I called these Charcuter-TEA cups to represent a tea party. In each cup were almonds, grapes, cubed gouda cheese, cubed mozzarella cheese, an Italian salami flower. A few crackers were placed on the saucer before serving.
To make the salami flower, I made them using the rim of a shot glass to keep them tight and compact.
The main dish was Drunken BBQ chicken wings that we grilled on the barbeque. These represented a Frat Party, so I served the side of BBQ sauce in a red solo cup shot glass!
We had mashed potatoes as a side dish, but added a little surprise to the center of each one to represent a Gender Reveal Party. Much like a gender reveal cake, we piped in blue or pink dyed potatoes into the center, so that when guest's cut into them, it would "reveal" the pink or blue.
I made a fruit cookie pizza for dessert to represent a Pizza Party. I bought a large pizza box from a local pizza place to use as a serving tray. For this recipe, I did not have to make my own cookie dough. It called for Pillsbury sugar cookie dough already made! You can put any fruit you want on this pizza, but I kept it simple with only strawberries, blueberries, and kiwi.
Favor: The parting gift for the guests represented Slumber Party. I tied together a sleep mask from the dollar store, an individual box of cereal, and a spoon. For the tag, it read, "You came dressed for another party...but everyone loves a slumber party." Then under that text I added, "Cereal-sly, Thanks for Coming!" My serving "tray" for these was a pillow for added fun.
This is the perfect party for a random occasion or a birthday party. It was so fun and easy to put together without costing a lot of money. Hope you throw a party like this soon!


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