{Paper, Parties} Wreath Place Cards

Remember when I said that we had set a record for the number of guests in our place at the December Birthdays Party? Well, we blew it out of the water the following Saturday when we had 22 people here, including 15 adults and 17 kids.

This was my first foray into "letting go" and using Chinette and plastic silverware instead of dropping change on extra dishes and silverware. As ridiculous as it is, I am totally proud of myself for that. But I did hide the silverware UNDER the towels so that I wouldn't die every time I walked by it.

This party's theme was "wreaths. Very simple wreaths, as putting "berries" on them was averaging 10 minutes/piece, so I stopped after 1.5 wreathes.

I also made wreath wine "charms" and little menus for each seat. Since we live in a postage stamp, we decided to plate the food. Each guest marked their food selections and handed them off to us like a pair of short order cooks. 

Does this look familiar? I had an idea involving felt wreaths and pillar candles, but going to Michael's on weekends frightens me.

{Parties} Office Christmas Party

I whipped up a quick Christmas party for my officemates. We scored the Cityscape bar a few hours before it opened to the public, ordered some pizzzas, and hung out and enjoyed the company and the the views.

I was decorating this out-of-pocket, so I tried to do it on the somewhat cheap with tissue paper flowers, personal decorations, and cute Christmas crackers and cupcake flags from Mara-Mi.

 The cupcakes were from Sugar Bliss, of course. Their "hot chocolate" cupcake is like pure crack to me. Or at least what I think crack would be like.

The views are so amazing.

{Paper, Parties} Oh, By Gosh, By Golly, It's Time for Mistletoe and Holly

We celebrated our family's December birthdays at our place...with a houseful of people! Twelve adults and four kids was our (then) record for guests.

I had been hemming and hawing and brainstorming for an affordable idea for this table for over a month and ended up putting it together with things that I had around the house an hour before guests arrived. Andy and I found these antique candlesticks at an antique store in Wisconsin over the summer. I was so excited to see that they hold the electric "candles" that I bought a few years ago and never got to use. The flowers were a holiday bouquet from the grocery store. Andy was so proud of himself for picking them out.

I learned the hard way at Halloween that no one pays attention to photo or numbered wine charms. I used my Silhouette to cut personalized "wine charms" for everyone. They were brilliant.

But the place cards...they're definitely in my top 5 of all time. I loved them!

Each guest had a unique-ish design. I had 14 in total.

Even the kids got place cards - although, not a single one of them cared.

{Paper, Parties} Global Warming-Inappropriate** Birthday Party Photo Place Cards

Christmas has been in full swing up in here -- even a 2.5 week battle with bronchitis* and sinusitis couldn't even bring us down this season. The real fun begins this week.

The first of seven parties that we attended this month was a celebration of my mother-in-law, who turned a number that shall not be named. We celebrated at Chicago Cut, as is our sorta-milestone-tradition, with our other sorta-traditions, photo place cards and cake.

The cake was from Sugar Bliss. I *totally* recommend them! I scored the parrot tulips at the deli in the East Bank Club. How lucky was that? I was way too sick to walk to a real florist.

I made the cake topper by layering die-cut snowflakes with 3D foam squares and attaching them to wooden skewers. Not ideal, but it worked in a 2 a.m.-the-night-before pinch.

For the place cards, I used my Silhouette to cut 5.5 circles with the guest's name and a hole for the photo. Then, I inserted the photo and some shiny white paper behind the name. I attached the entire piece to an ornament card and embellished it with an off-white ribbon and more shiny white die-cut snowflakes. The napkins are cheapos from Home Goods. They're OK. They shrunk to cocktail napkins in the wash.

*I am pretty sure that I broke or pulled something major when coughing. 

**When Andy and I selected this not-to-Christmas Christmas snowflake theme back in October, we weren't expecting it to be 60 degrees in December. 

Thanksgiving Place Cards

I woke up on Thanksgiving morning and decided that my mother's table needed some place cards. Oddly enough, I had turkey cards and plenty of jewel-toned place cards and paper in my stash. I grabbed some streamers that I had laying around and whipped these up while watching the parade and getting the stink eye from Andy, re: my getting into the damn shower already.