Planning a Party or Event–

Event planning is always fun although stressful, it’s usually a fulfilling feeling when you see the completed masterpiece and all your hard work coming to a finish.

I use to do some of the parties at my old job so I’ve gained some knowledge on what it takes to put an event together. The next one I had to conquer was my little Buddha Belly’s first year fiesta!!!

At first I was overwhelmed at what it was going to take, who I was inviting, oh and most importantly what the theme was going to be. After much deliberation safari popped up in my head and I had my theme!

Is it going to be a small gathering or full-blown fiesta? I started writing down name after name after name and the list kept growing and growing, and yes growing. I was at about 52 adults and 13 kids! I don’t know how either, but it was clear I was having a full-blown shindig.

Time to figure out what day your having the party. Does her birthday fall on a weekend? If not will it be the week before or the week after? We decided to do her birthday the day before on a Saturday because Sunday parties suck!

Shoot so know how are people going to know when the party is? Invites. I searched every google image for a very long time before I finally found the perfect fit–

I got these from an Etsy account, Lollipop Prints for $10 which she can change to anything you want, emails it to you and you send them off to Walgreens to print. Mine cost $3.00. Besides her messing up the spelling of my daughter’s name which I had to make new prints all over again and her spelling “don’t” wrong, I loved them!

And FYI put a rain date on the invite just in case, I’ve been driving myself crazy with the possibility of rain for Saturday.

Next was figuring out the type of safari I wanted– traditional or with my twist?

My own twist won of course.

I love colors whether their bright or pastel, colors to me are gorgeous. From there it was figuring out what color scheme I wanted. I decided on bright orange, yellow, magenta, purple and cheetah balloons– bright colors!

Now add colors to balloons and you’re bound to have the bestest looking fiesta around, haha. I’m obsessed with balloons, balloons make me happy. But not happy like a creepy “looner” aka balloon fetishist like Chris here–

[youtube width=”400″ height=”250″]http://youtu.be/EqMxEBFfIHI[/youtube]

Yep! Not like him! Moving along…

So you’ve got your theme and color scheme down. What’s next? Decorations! This is the fun and dangerous part of it all. You can create anything you want down to the T, but when you’re working on your budget it’s not too much fun. Make sure you set your budget before proceeding!!!!

The first thing I did was google safari images to get some ideas which I did. I knew what I had to get which and that started me off– scrap-book paper to make a banner, bamboo table runners, raffia table skirts, and grass. I also visited Pinterest which is my new favorite app!

I visited sites like ShinDigz, Oriental Trading, Birthday Express and Party City. I browsed for hours days because I wanted to make sure everything fit with what was going on in my head. I also searched for some items online to see if I could get it cheaper somewhere else.

I started planning first week in April which can be a positive and a negative. It’s good because you’ll have everything set. It’s bad because if you have to return something you usually won’t be able to depending on what their return policy is.

On top of visiting those websites I also went to actual stores like Michaels, Party City and the 99Cent store. I love me a good deal!

Decorations done.

Next up was gift bag ideas. I had bought brown paper bags at the 99Cent store and didn’t know what exactly I was going to do with them. I had searched Pinterest and saw all the things that could be done so after I found a couple I combined them and again added my own twist to them.

Now it was deciding what kind of food you would be serving. Since its June and the summer (although beginning of June isn’t summer) everyone loves barbecues so I opted to do that. Hamburgers, hotdogs, chicken, rice, salads, potato sides, cake and cupcakes was what I was going to be feeding the guests.

And finally is setting up! I’ll have all the photos for you once the party is kaput from Saturdays festivities. 🙂

UPDATE
Check out her party went here, “Ziana’s Safari Birthday Party!”