Friday, April 9, 2010

Where have I been?

Work and home.  Why haven't I been posting?  Because I have been planning a surprise party for my parents' 35th Wedding Anniversary, which will be Saturday.  The party has been planned for months, but the last couple weeks has been crunch time!

Can I tell you how difficult it is to plan a surprise party?  I vow to never do this again!  My parents have almost ruined the surprise about 3 times.  Luckily I was, pulling my hair out, sneaky and got all the bugs worked out.

Also, it is very difficult to find 35th Wedding Anniversary decorations.  Therefore, I had to get a little crafty.  I thought I would show off what I did.  The traditional gift for the 35th is coral.  We decided to do a coral/beach theme.  Nothing over board.  Just suttle hints.

Don't be jealous, but I happen to be browsing around in the home section of Target and came across this tray on clearance for $3!  Perfect for placing finger foods on!

Next, displaying pictures.  I didn't want to do a collage or frames.  While looking around at Michael's, I thought filling a jar with sand and a sea shell, with the pictures, would work. 

Very inexpensive!
Since my mom's friend is going to be setting up the party while my brother and I distract my parents' out of their home, I thought I would make things easier on her and just get paper and plastic products.

I remembered I had this very cute container that could hold the plasticware and napkins!


Since I could not find anything that said, "35th" on it, Clint came up with a great idea of spray painting wooden numbers, drilling a hole at the bottom, and gluing them on sticks!


For finishing touches, I am going on a hunt tomorrow for coral color flowers.

The cheap break down:

Food/Beverages.................$250
Paper/Plastic Products......$10
Wood Numbers..................$1.40
Sticks..................................$0.40
Jars.....................................$6.00
Sand...................................$3.00
Shells..................................$3.00
Tray...................................$3.00
Spray Paint........................$6.00
Flowers................................$15.00

Total:   $297.00!!

Ways we saved:

-Having the party at my parents home
-Making the invites myself
-Making our own decorations
-Making some of the finger foods

I'll post pictures next week of the set up and party!

8 comments:

elizabeth said...

so glad your back - have missed your posts!!
How cool is your anniversary party!!! and i love all the decorations you came up with -
especially the sand and jar pictures.
Hope you post pictures of the party -

enjoy the party!!

The Brick Cottage said...

I love how you incorporated the traditional anniversary gift into the theme of the party. The coral plate is pretty--I can't help it if I'm jealous! Best of luck pulling off the surprise!

Kelly@TearingUpHouses said...

That's a pretty good reason to be pre-occupied!

Hope it goes well!

Kelly

Kasey at Thrifty Little Blog said...

I love the coral theme... and the budget! They're going to love it!!

LizzieBeth said...

I love love LOVE how you turned the tradition gift of coral to a beach-themed bash! How clever are you??

I cannot wait to see the pictures from the party!!

LB

micah said...

I love the coral/beach theme - so fun! And those jars with pictures inside - awesome!

Sara @ Russet Street Reno said...

Weird, my parents' 35th is this year, too! I thought about doing a party, but I hate party planning. I'm so not creative about crafty little things like that. I think it all looks lovely!

Meg said...

You did such a great job! Very clever and very thoughtful. So how did they almost ruin the surprise? Doesn't that always seem to happen? I want to hear about that and I also want a recap of the party! Especially their reaction to finding out that it was a surprise party and how they almost ruined it!