Clue Party: A Dinner to Die For

I've always wanted to host a Clue themed party.  It was one of my favorite board games growing up, and my own kids love it now too.  I have always loved the mystery of the game, & there are so many fun aspects to the board game, I knew it would be fun to incorporate them into a dinner party.  Can't wait to hear what you think.

Invite:  The board game of clue (and the movie) centers around a group of 6 guests who are invited to a secluded mansion in New England.  When the guests arrive, they are given pseudonyms: Colonel Mustard, Miss Scarlet, etc.  A seventh guest, Mr. Boddy comes and then ends up dead, so the mystery of "who done it?" begins.  I fashioned my invitation of the idea that Mr. Boddy had invited everyone to a "Dinner to Die For." 

For added fun, I asked the girls to dress up as one of the characters.  I let them pick the character so that it wasn't stressful trying to come up with something to wear in that color. This photo is of course Colonel Mustard! I was having 8 guests at this dinner, and I didn't want any character repeated, so I did invent two characters that are not part of the original game: Miss Black and Madame Maroon.

Decor: I hosted the party outdoors because of the uncertainty of the pandemic.  All the guests are fully vaccinated, but fresh air outside seemed like a better option.  I set up my outdoor patio as if it had 3 "rooms" from the game.  The first was the Dining Room. I set the table with a simple black tablecloth and a game of clue in the center.  On top of the game, I had all 6 weapons from Clue: the candlestick, lead pipe, revolver (a cap gun), wrench, knife, and rope.  I also designed the Dining Room card to put in a frame.

In the "dining room" on the centerpiece, I had all the player pieces sitting around the dining room table just for fun.  For the two players I had to invent so we didn't repeat, I just painted Hershey kisses!

For place cards, I made playing cards to match each of the characters the guests dressed up as.  I could have used the cards from the actual game, but decided to make them with images online instead.  This made them not as clear as I would have hoped for, but it was fine.

For my invented characters, I just looked up vintage dress in black and maroon, and then used Photoshop to create a card that looked like the real thing.

At each place setting, I had a napkin to match the character color.  On top of the napkin was a confidential envelope I created to look like the one from the game that holds the true "killer card, weapon card, and room card" that everyone is trying to guess in the game.  I made the envelopes on Photoshop, and then folded and glued them after they were printed.  This envelope was part
of party activities (keep reading to here more about it!)

I had fun designing wine labels for this dinner.  I used the white and red characters to weave into my wines.  I served Mrs White's Wine White and Miss Scarlet's Blood Red Wine.  The labels matched the invitation and other party details.

For wine charms, I used the weapon pieces from the board game.  I tied them onto the stem of the wine glasses with ribbon.  My family has 6 Clue games total as my husband picked many of them up for 50 cents from garage sales or thrift stores.  For the extra two pieces, I just used a set that was in gold rather than silver from one of the games.

I served my wine in the Conservatory and borrowed my daughter's violin to add to the decor.

Menu:  Beyond incorporating the names of the two characters into the wine, my menu was built around all 6 characters.  We started with bruschetta as an appetizer, and I designed a menu tag to display it as Miss Scarlet's Red Tomato Bruschetta.

For the main dish, I served a chicken and mushroom dish that I titled Miss Peacock's Poultry.  This is one of the delicious recipes I have made often for dinner parties as it is always a hit with guests.  

Mr. Green's Green Beans were a side dish.  Simple, but tasty.

Another side dish was Colonel Mustard's Potatoes.  I found this recipe online and decided to try it out.  I really loved the dijon and honey taste in this dish.  The guests loved it as well.

For dessert, I made a plum cobbler to go with Mr. Plum.  I baked it while we were eating the rest of the meal, so it was freshly baked and warm when I served it.  I served it a la mode with Mrs, White's Vanilla Ice Cream.

Party Activities:  We didn't play the actual board game, but I did want to incorporate part of the mystery and the who done it aspect.  I had my daughter put one character, one weapon, and one room card in the game's confidential envelope just as you would if you were playing a true game of Clue.  This left 18 cards to be given out to guests to use as they decipher and guess the who done it.  As each guest arrived, I gave them one card.  I secretly set the timer on my phone for 20 minutes.  When it went off, I instructed any guest that was actually speaking when the timer went off was to show their card to the person they were directly speaking to.  This was a fun way to guests to find out other's cards, but it didn't hinder our ability to just relax and catch up on girl talk.

When everyone arrived, we played a game a riddles to give out the next 3 cards.  I gave the girls 5 minutes to figure out the riddles.  The top 3 scorers earned a second card.  

This game took place in the "Lounge" as we were sitting on my patio furniture.

I also created a "Library."  When all the guests had arrived I instructed them that they may visit the library one at a time at any point in the night that they wished.  However, they could only peruse ONE book.  I told them I hoped the chosen a very rewarding book, but it was a mystery.  

I put the exact number of books to equal my guests in my fake library, and in three of the 8 books, I put another Clue card.

To give out the last of the Clue cards, I put three of them into the Confidential envelopes I made at each place setting.  I put them randomly.

For the other guests who didn't get the Clue Cards, I made just fake cards so you couldn't tell from the outside.  Toward the end of the evening, we went around the table making guesses and showing cards much like occurs in the real game.  Eventually, we found a winner and one of the guests was able to guess the character, weapon, and room correctly. 

Favor:  As a parting gift, I made spy glasses out of Oreos and Pocky sticks.  I dipped the Oreos in white chocolate (I suggest the double stuffed Oreos) and added a Pocky stick as a handle.  Pocky sticks are super tasty, but very fragile.  I broke many along the way, but they looked good!  A chocolate rim was piped on the white chocolate to make it look more like a spyglass.

I designed a tag that read, "I definitely have a CLUE what a good friend is...YOU!"

All in all, this dinner was a lot of fun to plan and fun to participate in.  I think all of us enjoyed the time together and the theme.  Definitely add Clue to your roster of fun themes to try with friends!

Road Trip USA: Navigating the Northeast

My family just completed a month long road trip visiting the Northeastern states - 21 to be exact!  It was a great trip, and we created amazing memories visiting historical landmarks, hiking in national and state parks, visiting family, and just enjoying time together.  We just got back at midnight Friday, so Monday came quickly for this monthly dinner! A bit stressful getting it all together, but a great time catching up with friends and sharing parts of our vacation.

Invite:  Of course the invitation was red, white, and blue for this theme of traveling the US.  I added some graphics of the more popular national landmarks that we saw on the trip to the invite as well.

Decor:  I really only had one day to prepare for this dinner, so my decorations stayed simple.  I decorated my dinner table with patriotic decorations I already had and souvenirs we bought on our vacation.  My husband loves to buy pint glasses from various places, so I used those.   I also added the 3 ornaments I purchased on our trip and a few of the magnets.

One of the places we visited on our trip was the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden were we saw the iconic cherry/spoon fountain.  Had to have a little fun with a photo.

I decided to recreate this for my place cards.  At first, my plan was to make a cherry out of red chocolate so it would be edible.  However, I could not find a chocolate mold that would work.  I bought two off Amazon, but one was massive (like a mini apple), and the other was tiny (like a pea)!  Instead, I used a real cherry and just hot glued them on to plastic silver spoons I bought at the dollar store.

I also used some of the many magnets we purchased on our trip to place on the napkins.

Above my drink table, I used a silver United States map I already owned and cut each of the 21 states we visited out of cardstock to place on it.  This took some time, but wasn't too difficult. I probably could have used my Cricut, but I was worried about matching up with how the states are drawn on the metal sign.

When we first started traveling with our kids, we started collecting pressed pennies.  The kids love trying to find these machines in the places we travel, and they take turns "pressing" the penny.  I love that this is a super inexpensive souvenir! We have the pennies from our vacations all in a jar on our travel mantle.  I decided to use a few of the pressed pennies from our trip as wine charms.  I glued them to cardstock and attached them.

When we visited George Washington's home at Mount Vernon in Virginia, we saw his vineyard and grounds.  We purchased a bottle of Mount Vernon red wine when we were there, and since we didn't drink it on our trip, it made a perfect beverage for this dinner.  We didn't purchase any white wine on our vacation in the northeast, so I just served a general white wine.

In addition to wine, I also had Sam Adams Boston Lager.  We are all wine drinkers, so the 6-pack went untouched for the night, but a couple of the guests took one home.

Menu:  My menu consisted of some of the most iconic foods from a few of the states we visited.  We started with an appetizer of Wisconsin Cheese Curds.  YUM!  I made these in my air fryer and served them with ranch and ketchup.  I used this recipe.  These take time to bread, but once that is done, the air fryer makes cooking and clean up easy.  I created a tag for each menu item, and incorporated a popular slang phrase from that state/city.  For the Wisconsin Cheese Curds, I used the phrase "yous guys."

For the main dish, I served Philly Cheesesteak Hoagies.  These were also easy to make and tasty.  I cut up the green peppers and onions early in the day and marinated the meat more than the 20 minutes the recipe calls for just so I could have a few more things done ahead of time.  In Philly, locals also use the word "youse," so I included that word on my menu tag for these hoagies.

Of course, french fries go great with Philly Cheesesteaks, and a popular food in Delaware is vinegar fries.  I have been using my air fryer to make fries for my family lately, but since I was using that for the cheese curds and this was a large batch of fries, I decided to use the oven instead.  These Salt and Vinegar fries worked out great.  I sliced the potatoes earlier in the day and kept them in water. Then just prepped them quickly and stuck them in the oven to bake.

For dessert, I made a Boston Cream Pie.  I haven't made this type of pie before, but the recipe was pretty straightforward.  It is a bit more time consuming to make than some other desserts.  I made it the night before the dinner and then assembled it the morning of the dinner.  Representing Boston, I had to call it "wicked good" for my menu tag.

Favor:  My kids LOVE to collect the sample bottles of shampoo and conditioner from the hotels on our trip.  My son's suitcase was practically full of them by the end of this vacation.  I decided to use these to create a fun and funny favor for our dinner.  I gave each guest a shampoo and a conditioner from one of our stops.  I created a tag that read, "Hotel Greetings from _____" and picked one of the cities we stayed overnight in on this trip to fill in the blank.  I also added a "Thanks for Coming. Love you!" message to the tag, but replaced the word love with the iconic love statue that started in Philly.  

While it was a bit crazy and a little stressful to pull off a monthly dinner only a couple days after returning from vacation, I haven't missed a month of these dinners in 14 years, so I didn't want to miss now!  Plus I got to see my amazing friends.  A win win to top off a fabulous vacation! 

Get Ready to ROCK!

After over a year of monthly dinners on Zoom because of the pandemic, we were finally able to meet in person!  I cannot tell you how happy it made me to be able to sit around the table with my girlfriends and chat, laugh, and interact like we did before the pandemic.  

At the beginning of the pandemic last March, my daughter and I began painting rocks to decorate our yard and place around the neighborhood for others to enjoy.  I thought this would make a fun craft to do during a monthly dinner, so I have been waiting to do this theme until our monthly dinner group could begin meeting in person again.  This month was the time! So...let's get ready to ROCK!

Invite:  I put together the monthly dinner invitation on Photoshop with images I found online.  I used a font that looked like paint to match the theme.

Decor: I kept the table very simple and craft-friendly.  I used a cheap plastic tablecloth so that if paint dropped on it, it wasn't a big deal. The centerpiece was just the craft supplies we would need for the fun.  This included a basket of various paint colors, a paint can with brushes, a tray of paint markers, and a glass bowl with rocks to choose from.  I also added some rocks that I painted to the table.

I used bright pink napkins for a fun pop of color.  I added a small paint palette and paintbrush to the top of the napkin and tied a ribbon around all 3.

I was originally planning to paint a rock specifically for each guest and use it as a placecard, but I ran out of time.  Instead, guests drew another guest's name from a paint can when they arrived, and they spent the first bit of the party designing a rock for that person.  It was sweet to see what the girls came up with.

With summertime approaching, I decided to serve a simple drink "on the rocks" for guests.  I went with a low calorie and refreshing drink that mixes a shot of Smirnoff pink lemonade with Lemoncello La Croix.  I painted a lemon-themed rock to place next to these ingredients.  This might be one of my go-to drinks for the pool this summer.

I also served red and white wine, and tied them to the theme with the wine labels I created.  I loved the pandemic mask of a wine glass rock!  Cracked me up.  I also painted a rock with a wine theme to place next to the bottles of wine.

Menu: I wanted all my menu items to keep with the rock theme.  I painted rocks to go with each dish, but also wanted the rocks to be silly/fun to add to our painted rock garden.

For an appetizer, I started with a pepper jack cheese ball that I shaped like a rock.  I called it the Pepper Jack Cheese Rock with "Boulder" Flavor. The recipe calls for some of the shredded cheese to be reserved to roll the ball in, but I put all the cheese inside the ball and crushed blue corn tortilla chips to coat the cheese ball with to give it more of a rock color/look.  This cheese ball was easy to make and very tasty.  It was polished off quickly by all of us.

Three Cheers for Softball

We are in the midst of softball (and baseball) season in our house.  Love watching my kids play sports, but I can never get those gosh darn softball cheers out of my head!  If you've never been to a softball game, the girls are constantly chanting to pump up their team. They really are catchy, and I find myself using the chants in our daily lives throughout softball season because they are just stuck in my head!  Like "1-2-3-4 what do you think that fork is for? EATING. EATING" is how I've changed the words in one chant when my kids use their fingers instead of a fork at the dinner table.   Or "2-4-6-8 who do I appreciate...Cleaners. Cleaners" when the kids actually stop playing their devices long enough to help me clean the house.  Since I can't get them out of my head, I decided to make them my theme for the monthly dinner!  So here goes Three Cheers for Softball, and all I did to make a fun dinner party out of this theme.

Invite:  I made the invite with a softball field background and a giant clipart softball.  I used sporty fonts and incorporate a softball cheer as well as softball lingo into the text of the invite.

Party Details:  I always have fun creating wine labels for my monthly dinners.  For these labels, I wanted to come up with a softball cheer to fit my theme, but somehow tweak it to be about wine.

For the white wine, I used a cheer that the girls to for a batter from their team when she comes up to bat.  They chant, "Ella is a friend of mine (rip rip), she can RIP it anytime!"  I simply switched a few words up to apply to wine!  I also photoshopped a heart-shaped softball to be the white wine inside of the glass.

For the red wine, I used a team chant.  I made Wine Drinkers a team name and just changed the last line from "if you can't hear us, we'll shout a little louder " to "if you can't hear us, drinking'll sure make us louder."  I photoshopped a softball jersey with the new team name on it as well.

I made a simple softball napkin by folding a yellow napkin in half and adding softball laces I cut out with my Cricut machine.

Menu: I am hosting my monthly dinners virtually still because of COVID-19, so all parts of the meal have to be packed up to go.  I used a round container for this meal, so I cut the menu into a circle to fit on the lid.  If you don't know softball, you probably won't get the softball cheers I used, but I'll explain them a bit for those that aren't blessed with hearing these cheers over and over every game for not only one daughter and her games, but two!

The main dish was St. Louis Ribs that I smoked on my Traeger smoker.  I bought them already seasoned from Costco, so all I had to do was place them on the smoker.  Five hours later, they were delicious.  One of the cheers the girls chant often is "R-I-P  I-T Rip it for me baby, Rip it!"  I just swapped the P for a B to spell out R-I-B and make it RIB it!

I also served a bases "LOADED" baked potato with shredded cheese, bacon, chives, and a ramekin of sour cream on the side.  This went with the cheer, "Bases loaded. Pitcher's Nightmare. Bases loaded. Batter's Dream" which the girls chant when they have runners on every base and they want to encourage their next batter to knock them in.

Along with these, I also made a melon BALL salad with watermelon, cantaloupe, and honeydew.  I shaped them into balls to go with the chant, "1-2-3-4 What do you think our feet are for? WALKING. WALKING."  The girls chant this after their teammate is walked by the pitcher and gets a free base.

For dessert, I decided to make a pie that could go with the chant softball players use when a batter on their team doesn't swing at a bad pitch "G-double o-D  E-Y-E. Good eye. Good eye. Good eye."  I simply swapped the good "eye" for good "pie."  I served a Snickerdoodle Cream Cheese Apple Pie.  This was easy to make and delicious.  I will totally make it again as I got a lot of compliments on it. 

Favor:  For the party favor, I made softball sugar cookies.  I made them big like softballs, so they were about 3.5".  I frosted them in bright yellow and piped on the red stitches.

For the tag, I used the standard after game cheer, "2-4-6-8 Who do we appreciate?" The "team" for this dinner was of course, my Monthly Dinner Girls!  I made the tag to match the invite and the menu so everything looked similar.

This dinner was fun to put on, and it would be a fun one to have for a softball end-of-the-season party.  I hope you enjoyed this post as much as I enjoyed coming up with these dinner cheers! Now, if I can just get them out of my head for a bit, I'd be set!