party plan

To encourage you to host more dinner parties, I'm starting a new series where I plan an impromptu dinner party and take you along for the ride! If you love to cook and get an itch to entertain, call up your friends and invite them to dinner tonight. With my tips, recipes, and ideas, you will find that a fabulous party can happen without hours and hours of planning.

1. Start by choosing a location and menu. We decided to make a big green salad and two pizzas: One Greek style vegetarian and another Spanish style meat.
2. Create a grocery list. Shop for ingredients. Keep it hassle free. We picked up pizza dough from the neighborhood pizzeria.
3. Create a game plan and delegate tasks. I was in charge of the pizza sauce and dough. Sasha was in charge of pouring wine and making the salad, Erica was in charge of setting the table and inviting friends, and my sister was in charge of music and mood lighting.
4. Remember an impromptu party is not supposed to be stressful, it's supposed to be fun!!

To take a look at the recipes, pictures, and a video from the dinner, read more

Although the 4th of July has come and gone, summer is here to stay (well at least for the next 2 months!), making it the perfect time to throw a pool party. This week I'm all about bikinis, water balloons, and blended cocktails, so come party with me by following my pool party plan. A pool party is a "the more the merrier" type of party where you can invite people from different groups of friends to come together to enjoy the glorious weather and cool off in the water. When inviting a lot of people to any event, keep the invites as simple as possible. A chic flyer invite with images of water are ideal because they are easily mass produced and can be sent though regular email. To see how I made my invites, read more

I ended up throwing an impromptu dinner party last Wednesday. Instead of panicking, I took a deep breath, came up with an easy, manageable menu, and wrote out a grocery list. If you ever find yourself on the hosting end of an impromptu dinner party, be sure to check out my no fail planning tips.

• For appetizers make one dip (I made a quick Sun Dried Tomato Dip that involved no chopping) and round it out with store bought goodies. Bowls of burst-in-your-mouth blueberries, salty black olives, crispy flatbread, and buttery french bread crisps can be plated in a matter of minutes. Chunk a few pieces of smoked gouda or other cheese and slice up some salami.



• Choose a menu that is quick, easy and meat-free in case any vegetarians unexpectedly show up. Fresh Basil Pesto with pasta and a Green Salad With Citrus Vinaigrette is a simple meal that can be put together in under an hour.
• For dessert, have everyone help out and make ice cream sandwiches.
• Ask your guests to bring a bottle or two of wine.

What do you cook for your last-minute dinner parties?? Share your menus with me below!

To take a look at a gallery of images from my middle-of-the-week dinner, read more

Although this week I am all about the Bachelorette Party, I thought it would be helpful if I also discussed my bridal shower ideas. While the bachelorette party revolves around the bride's best girlfriends, the bridal shower involves all of the important females in the bride's life (mother, grandmother, aunts, cousins, etc.). Like the wedding, the bridal shower should reflect your personal style, attitudes, and preferences. Love to cook? Have it at a cooking class. Crafty? Host a knitting, pottery, or painting bridal shower. Pamper you and your ladies with a spa shower. Other ideas are a picnic, outdoor activity (horseback riding, white water rafting, etc), psychic reading, salsa dancing, sleep over, and tea party. Themes make planning the event much easier and so will my party tips so read more

Although a guide to your ceremony is not a must for your wedding, programs have become increasingly popular as of late. Like many other parts of the wedding stationery, you have full creative liability here. Generally the program should be in the same style and form as the invite, save the date card, directions, and any other part of the stationery trousseau. The program should start by listing the bride and groom's names as a title of sorts. Underneath include the wedding information: the location, date and time.

Next list the order of the service (circling, sharing of Kiddush cups, rings and vows, etc), the names of the wedding party (the best man, maid of honor, bridesmaid, etc) and the names of the parents and grandparents.
If you are having musicians at the ceremony it's customary to list them as well. Brief bios of the wedding party, vows, readings, a favorite love poem, songs, explanations of traditions, a monogram, your new address, directions to the reception, and a thank you or remembrance are all additions to the program. I recommend to avoid cheese, leave out any photos.

After you have decided the text of your program decide what form the program will take. A small one page booklet is the most traditional but anything goes. Small booklets tied with pretty ribbons, pull out accordions, flat postcards, long bookmarks, flip books, popsicle stick fans, and fan booklets are all wonderful artistic options. Speak with your stationer well in advance to figure out the design of the program and be sure to proof read the invite several times and check the spelling of names with everyone mentioned. To cut back on costs have the stationer print only the cover to your program and create a document on your computer to fill the rest of the pages. Decide whether each person will be handed a program or simply one for each couple and family.

I personally love the mini booklet idea because it can easily fit into a purse and the bows are so pretty. What about you? How was your wedding program designed?

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I'm taking on a pretty difficult task this week: planning a wedding. A few weeks ago I threw an engagement party for lucky reader julieulie and this week the wedding talk continues with my inspirational ideas and helpful tips for her wedding. Julie will have a traditional Jewish wedding in Philadelphia on the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend in 2008. Following DearSugar's wedding time line, the bride to be should start thinking about invitations at least six months before the date of the wedding. Wedding invitations are incredibly important to setting the tone, feel, and look of your event and when your guests receive a thick beautiful envelope in the mail, they should know that their presence is requested at a very special moment - think of the invite as a keepsake memento. If the wedding is a black tie formal event, it should be reflected in a sleek, elegant invitation with classic lettering. If the wedding is a low key beach party, the invitations can be more playful with seaside motifs. An invitation is about making a grand opening statement, so get artistically creative with your fiance(e) and let your style as a couple shine. Use the colors of your wedding in the paper, font, and detailing and choose a motif or symbol (a flower, your initials, a pattern, etc.) to give each aspect of the invitation a uniform look.

I spoke with my buddy Jake over at Paper Source, a wonderful resource for wedding invitations, and the colors that are hot this year are chocolate brown, bluebell blue, and vibrant red. Currently their best selling motif is a birds and leaf design. Remember that there is more than just an invitation that must be considered. A complete set of wedding invitations include (choose what you want to include inside the envelope with the invite):

• save-the-date cards
• the invitation
• response cards (this is how guests rsvp)
• programs
• seating cards
• place cards
• menu cards
• thank you notes
• directions to the location
• hotel information (if it's a destination wedding)

With wedding stationery, the options are limitless from the paper that you choose to the method of printing. The paper can come in many shapes, sizes, and textures with various glosses, finishes, and weights. Generally the heavier the cardstock, the more expensive the paper. The shape of a traditional invitation is a 4 1/2 by 6 1/4 inch flat card although Jake said that this year the A7 (roughly 7 by 5 inches) and A10 (about 4 by 9 inches) are popular.

The most formal and expensive printing method is engraving when the information about the party is etched into metal plates that are then impressed on the paper. Engraved invitations will have small indentations on the back of the paper along with raised type on the front. Engraving makes a powerful statement with a light colored text on a dark background. Letterpress is an old technique where the type is created by impression resulting with indented words that have a handmade feel. Offset lithography is flat printing that you'll find on standard greeting cards and invitations. This is the least expensive printing technique and can create very modern invitations. Thermography is another affordable option that uses a heat based process and a resin powder to create raised lettering that looks similar to engraving.

Now that we've covered the basics it's invitation making time! To see what I've created for Julie in her light blue, black, and white color scheme, read more

Guess what? This week I'm planning Naomi Watts' baby shower! As much as I wish I was a celebrity event planner, this is a virtual party plan that I'm creating per your requests! So many readers have asked for help with baby showers they're planning for girlfriends, sisters, and mothers, but since I don't know anyone who is pregnant, I thought it would be fabulous to design a luncheon for one of Hollywood's most chic starlets. The event has a light pink and baby blue theme that was established with the polka-dot invitations sent yesterday. The menu for the sit down lunch will be light, fresh, springy, vegetarian, and absolutely delicious. To see what simple appetizer will meet the all female crowd as they arrive, read more

I've been getting lots of requests for help in planning a baby shower, so this week I'm planning a baby shower for Naomi Watts. I don't know anyone who is pregnant, so I thought, hey I'll plan one for the beautiful actress. A baby shower is a time when mothers are bestowed with blankets, bottles, bibs, and advice on how to handle the little one once he or she arrives. Generally they are held by a friend, family member or co-worker, but never by the mother to be. Baby showers can also be celebrated after the baby is born, as they are in the Jewish culture, where tradition states that bestowing gifts upon an unborn baby is considered bad luck. My party for Naomi will be a lunch with the classic baby colors pale pink and light blue as the theme. Naomi is elegantly chic and I can't imagine her wanting a cheesy baby shower, so I'll do everything I can to make things stylish, lovely, and sophisticated - starting with the invitations. To see how the simple color combination can inspire an entire party, read more

As I was surfing the web for Easter decorating inspiration, I came across a lot of scary bunny decorations and plenty of tacky pastel eggs. That's why I decided my Easter party's look has to be chic, adult, and very modern. I established sunny yellow and cool green by sending invitations in those colors, so I'll incorporate them into the look and table setting. Whether you're hosting a brunch or dinner, pouring mimosas or wine, keep the atmosphere light and fabulous with my spring look: read more

I've said this before and I'll say it again: I love dinner parties. I love intimate family dinners, elaborate planned meals with a group of select friends, and last night I was reminded of how much I love impromptu dinner parties. My mom ran into one of her best friends from college who asked us to come by her house for a quick drink. She lives in a beautiful house overlooking the bay and when we arrived, the house was filled with wonderful aromas of something delicious in the kitchen. Wine was poured, we got to talking and it turns out her husband had made a fresh pesto dish with basil fresh from his garden. He had the fixings for salad too and my dad happened to have a fresh baguette in his car that he had picked up at the Ferry building. I set the table in their dining room and BAM! instant dinner party! It was absolutely wonderful, good fun paired with fabulous food and company. But not everyone is like me and my hosts from last night, Dave and Michelle - so to learn a few tricks to pull off a successful last minute surprise dinner party, read more