Apartment Guide’s “Old Friends, New Space” Challenge
February 21, 2011 by Shelley
I need your help. Desperately! This past weekend I was contacted by Apartment Guide and was asked to take on a challenge.
The challenge: Create an entertainment area or tablescape and throw a party in that space, within the next week! Yes, WEEK! It took me WEEKS (even months) to plan my latest parties for my twins and little guy. I need some creative inspiration and FAST! Up for grabs for your ideas,… a $100 gift card.
Things to consider:
*Apartment Guide stresses that you don’t need a huge home to entertain stylishly. You can entertain in a space of any size. {Whew, my 1,3oo square-foot home isn’t exactly a party mansion}.
*This is a small adult gathering. 4-5 couples will be invited. {Sheesh, I don’t even know who I’m inviting yet}.
*The budget is firmly set at $300 (food included).
*This could be as informal as a movie night with neighbors, or a sit-down dinner with friends.
Ideas? I want this to be a fun ‘themed’ social. While I was brainstorming I came up with a few theme ideas. Having said that, I am NOT committed to using any of them. Here are a few of my random thoughts:
1. Highschool Reunion Theme
-Guests provide pictures of themselves in highschool. PERFECT DECOR.
-Guests bring entertaining stories about their date in high school.
-Dress in STYLE by wearing high school apparel from the year you graduated. Yes, letterman’s jackets are appropriate.
-Dinnerware: cafeteria trays.
-Food: Square pizza, tatertots, milk cartons.
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2. College Alumni Party
-Represent your school or team!
-Again, college pictures would make fabulous decor.
-Guests bring entertaining stories about their date in college. I’m sure a few love stories would be told. {awwww}.
-Food: microwaveable.
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3. Around-the-world dinner party
Decor: Maps (of course)!
-Everyone represents a destination they have traveled to.
-Guests would dress in culture.
-Guests would bring ethnic dishes from location.
-Everyone shares a story of travels.
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Do any of those theme ideas sound fun to you? Ideas to make them better? Different theme ideas completely?
I’ve been studying Apartment guides tips on entertaining in small spaces, hints on creating a mood with music, and suggestions how to set a table in style. They have great tips for decorating, entertaining and making the most of your space. It’s really helpful information no matter where you live.
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I can’t wait to hear all of your ideas! I will be posting this party and hopefully implementing several of your ideas! Thank you in advance for your creative ideas.
*Remember, thanks to Apartment Guide, a $100 gift card for a HowDoesShe reader. To qualify, simply ‘like’ ApartmentGuide on Facebook (or follow “AptGuide” on Twitter), then come back here and leave your party suggestion.
Ready, set, PARTY!
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How about a Panini and Bellini party? Set up a panini bar in the kitchen. Provide guests with a few choices of meats, cheeses, veggies, spreads and breads. Have each guest choose their panini fillings and press it themselves in a panini press (available at Target for around 30 bucks). Have some dessert panini items too (nutella and banana–ummm…yum!). For the Bellini use some pureed peaches (buy them frozen and puree them in a blender) add about 2 oz pureed peach to 4 oz of champagne in a champagne flute and you have a bellini! For a non alcoholic version use sparkling white grape juice in place of champagne. Provide guests with an Italian Bistro atmosphere by creating small conversation corners. Use red or white tablecloths and a simple vase with a single stem in the center of the tables. Play some classic Italian bistro music that can easily be found on a compilation CD. For fun, scatter some hand made flash cards with English to Italian phrases around the room. For a game you can collect the cards later and see who was really paying attention to them!
The food description alone almost had me drooling. Yum. Yum. Yum.
Game night with an old hollywood theme. Pictionary, coctails and appetizers, rounding out the night with a classic film staring someone like Marilyn Monroe.
I like Apartment Guide on Facebook….What about a Tacky Party? Tell everyone to dress tacky. You can serve food on paper towels or really bad plates or no plates at all, just on the table cloth with no utensils. lol You can serve the food straight from a jars, i.e. jar of pickles with a fork in it (or no fork at all!). Or serve foods that are just plain bad/embarrassing to eat in public (i.e. spaghetti, really cheesy chips – the kind that stain your fingers, etc.). The possibilities are truly endless! We did this once and after you start planning it, you just keep finding more things that would work. It is so fun and way doable with your budget!
A fun game we played (I can’t remember the name right now, I think it is called “Pig”), but everyone is sitting in a circle and one person is blindfolded in the center of the circle (once said person has their eyes covered, everyone changes places). The person in the middle has a stick (a broom stick works nice) and points to someone. The person closest to where the stick is pointing to then snorts like a pig. It is the job of the blindfolded person to guess the name of the person snorting. If he/she is wrong she points to someone else. She/he gets three tries and then everyone mixes up again. If the blindfolded person guesses correctly then the snorter then becomes it. This game is hilarious and a big hit and usually you guess who it is because of their laughter and inability to snort! You can also change it to another animal sound if you don’t want to do a pig snort.
There are so many other tacky games you could play…if you need more, let me know…I just need more than my 10 minutes here to think about it! lol Good luck on your party!
THIS would be a fun night huh?! and I have played that pig game,…it rocks!
Another idea I think would be fun, is a bake/cook off with mystery ingredients. You can have everyone help make the food for the party while there and either judge for taste or creativity. Like homemade pizza (everyone can make individual/couple/group pizza, ice cream sundaes with lots of fun toppings, etc.) You would want to pick foods that don’t need everyone using the stove at once. If you wanted, you could add mystery ingredients that each couple has to include with their creation. They could be precooked and set aside in random bags to be handed out when needed, so the host can even be surprised at what she gets. Maybe someone would get chocolate sauce with their pizza! lol Not all the way thought out, I’m sorry, but I had to get this posted before I forget tomorrow! lol
I LOVE this idea. All these ‘chef’ shows are amazing, and this would be great with a big group of friends,…not to mention some fun interesting food.!
My sister and I do themed tea parties. Some of our themes have been tropical island where the table is covered with a hula skirt tablecloth, guest are provided with flip-flops and a lei, the centerpiece is a lush tropical flower design, Victorian rose with roses, an ornate white wire teapot centerpiece and guests receive a teacup ornament, pirates adventure where I use black ceramic skillet dishes and the napkin ring is one I made with the pirate eye patch, Easter bunny breakfast, bird fest where the placemats are green moss and one of the appetizers is a biscuit shaped like a bird, at the hop incorporating poodle skirts and saddle shoes. I just pick a theme and go with it!!
I want MY sister to live by me so we can do themed tea parties {jealous}! How fun!
I love everyone’s ideas! Since it is springtime, you could do a Picnic themed party! You could have picnic baskets and checkered table linens, and even blankets! It could be an intimate setting with fresh wild flowers. You could do this indoors or outside! Have light fare, and lots of cute little fingerfoods! Watermelons, grapes, cherries, wine, finger sandwiches, kids could blow bubbles! It would be so relaxed and set the mood for springtime.
If it’s a party for a few couples—do a Famous Couples party —each couple comes dressed as a famous couple–prize for best couple costume. My husband and I went as John Lennon and Yoko Ono (mainly because my husband refused to dress up–I had a black dress black sunglasses long black hair and a big floppy hat. I brought a chocolate bundt cake that I made–I went to the dollar store and bought a bunch of plastic beetles to decorate the cake with. One couple came as Bonnie and Clyde, Lucy & Desi, The best was one couple came as JFK and Jackie –and the couple brought an extra with them and he dressed as Marilyn.
The best part is that most of the guys don’t have to dress up–(because they won’t) most couples are recognized by the female.
Ahhhh! I love the ‘extra’ as Marilyn. LOL!
I know all about small spaces. We purchased our condo in Hawaii while stationed there and it was only 800 sq feet! I LOVE to host parties so we had a different theme each month. One of our favs was a Wine Tasting party. Everyone purchased two bottles of wine and placed them in a bag, one to serve one for winning wine. It was so funny b/c some people had nice wines while others purchased boxed wines. I made pupus (mainly different cheese and bread) to go along with our red wine theme. I made sheets to score the wine. We all love wine but did not score in old fashion way. It was so funny at the end reading comments. The person who had the wine that scored the highest/best got to take home the second bottle of wine everyone purchased.
How about a romantic fondue party. If you have ever been to The Melting Pot restaurant, this is easy to create at home. You will need a couple electric fondue pots. Start with the 1st course of cheese fondue with bread cubes, celery and apples. Each person has their own set of color coded fondue forks for dipping. 2nd course is the salad course. 3rd course is the main course. Chicken, steak, shrimp, salmon cut into small pieces and cooked in pots of broth with seasoning or a wine broth..(many recipes online). Also cut potatos, broccolli and mushrooms to cook in the broth. Serve with various dipping sauces. 4th course is chocolate fondue with marshmallows, strawberries, bananas, rice krispy treats, brownies, etc. This is a fun dinner that you can have cut and prepared ahead of time. It also takes about 2 hours to complete the meal, plenty of time for talking and enjoying the food and company. There are many recipes online for the fondues!
I love your idea and can’t wait to see the pictures!!
Fondue party!!! Bring back the 70s favorite! We love to do fondue! Check out my fondue party we did for val. Day
http://thebaezablog.blogspot.com/search/label/fondue