Thoughts......
Wow, what can I say, I can't believe this was our "8th Year" of keeping this tradition alive! It's been so much fun. We started this tradition the first year we had started dating, in a tiny little one bedroom apartment, it's evolved into needing to book at venue and hire professional vendors! I love how excited our friends get about this too...they start asking for clues on the upcoming theme in July :)
Setting the Scene....
This year after much talk and thought we decided to host this year's party at
Regency Garden (which is a lovely wedding venue that I coordinate at weekly). It's funny how our Halloween parties tend to be almost time stamped, due to where we are in our lives at the time.
Once I had officially booked the location, the theme is easy! Regency has this very Chicago/New York vibe to it, many of its design influences came from New Orleans Square in Disneyland. So, our theme
"The Boss Calls for You" was born.
The best part about it was, hardly any decorations were even needed....just some nice floor length linens and some gorgeous centerpieces (sadly there weren't many decor photos taken, everyone was having too good of a time)...but the centers were these amazing wrought iron tall holders with a floral display on top. In addition we had dripping pearls, poker chips, and a splash of playing cards scattered on the tables~looked awesome! All of the flowers were provided by the talented team at
Crismons Flowers.
A Savory Affair provided a mouth-watering Italian feast for all the guests to enjoy, complete with pastas, sauces, meat balls, caesar salad, antipasto display, breads....and most importantly an amazing dessert table! My sweet cousin Nina brought in homemade Tiramisu, that just topped everything off deliciously!
And what amazing duo was responsible for the rocking dance floor all night? That would certainly be
The BarGuys responsible for keeping the libations flowing and Sarah with
Birkett Entertainment who kept the music pumping.
And of course let's not forget my rock star photo team
Still Life Studios, who captured so many amazing photos, it was difficult for me just to choose a small handful for the blog!
And lastly, one of the most unique vendors had to be the girls from
Troupe Harmony (shown below) they are actually a group of very talented belly dancers....but for one night only transformed themselves into "Flapper/Mobster" Girls ~with a belly dancing twist!
The key to having a successful event, if working with the right team of vendors, no doubt about it!
The People......
All I can say is umm...wow. To be honest we were a little nervous to host our party at Regency at first, for fear that the size of the venue would be too large.
(Event planning 101: You never want a space that is too big, it creates a feeling of emptiness and low energy..it's better to be crowed than too spacious) However once the word was out, the RSVPs kept rolling in. I believe, if I counted correctly..... we had over 70 guests in attendance ~which was awesome!
We had our Halloween Party "regulars", along with many
new faces, which was very exciting!
The Moments......
So many fun things happened....it's hard to name them all...but I will try~
my favorite moments included:
1.) Walking into Regency and being so warmly greeted by Chris Nagy, the owner of Regency. He had done so many things to go the extra mile for our party and he was so excited to host our event!
2.) Being able to hug and chat with so many old friends.
3.) Meeting so many new friends.
4.) Pulling up Justin in front of everyone and telling him that we weren't really having our Halloween Party, we were actually there to renew of Wedding Vows....I was of course kidding, but his face was priceless
5.) Dick Tracy winning the Costume Contest
6.) Me...falling ever so
non gracefully smack in the middle of dance floor in front of everyone...the sad part was that I had only had one glass wine by this time, I'm just
that clumsy (I left these photos off of the blog, sorry)
7.) Nina's Outfit, enough said
8.) Dancing with Trevor and Isis, they flew all the in from Berkeley to attend!
9.) Jimmy's enormous Rugby bump on his head, that so went so well with his costume.
10.) Noah's "Footloose" Dance, of course
11.) Embarrassing Addie in front of all her co-workers
12.) Matt doing his splits
The Memories.....what I will cherish from this night...
1.) Seeing my husband smile, dance, and having so much fun ~after several stressful months
2.) Justin surprising me with a special song dedication~actually made me tear up
3.) Dancing so much I could barely walk the next day~thank you Michael Jackson, Usher & Sir Mix A Lot
# 23. Host our 8th Annual Halloween Party ~can officially be checked off of my
101s in 1001 list!
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