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Very Unbirthday Party -58yr- Croquet & Tea

May 2008

Emily in St. Louis, MO, United States

Honorable Mention

I know that this site is mainly geared towards parents throwing birthday parties for their children, but for my mom's 58th birthday this year, I threw her a Mad Hatter/Alice in Wonderland Very Merry Unbirthday party.  She loves the Mad Hatter, and is up for anything, so I knew this would be perfect!  Plus it's a surprise, and who wouldn't love to walk into a surprise like this???  :o) 

First off, for the invitations, I started out with a fan of playing cards, gluing them to a piece of black card stock.  I found some scrapbook paper that had card suits on it, so I glued that to the other side of the card stock.  I then designed the main thing on the computer with sayings like by order of the Queen of Hearts" and "Don't be late for a very important date!"  and printed them off on cream colored card stock.  I folded them in half and glued them to the scrapbook paper side and attached a label that said "open me".  On the opposite side with the actual cards I glued a label that said "read me".  I used black envelopes with a gold pen to address them and added some red heart confetti inside the envelope for a surprise! 

For my decor:  In the front yard which I'll explain later.  On the back porch I had a bunch of long tables from my church set up with yellow tabel cloths all in one long row like the Mad Hatter's tea party table.  I had a "throne" for my mom decorated with crepe paper and just regular chairs set up for everyone else.  They were mixed and matched so they looked a little "mad".  I had one table set up for the food and one for drinks. 

On the tables I had topiaries with fresh gerbera daisies in red and yellow.  I made a canopy for the table by cementing doll rods into coffee cans painted with red and white polkadots and then attached the yellow table cloth to the top of the rods all the way down the table.  I had paper lanterns crepe paper and made a candy garland out of wrapped hard candies.  On the garage door in the back I made balloon flowers using one balloon for the center and five for the petals.  I used poster board for the stems. 

For favors a the table I made origami take-out boxes in really fun polka dot scrapbook paper and made paper fans (it was hot!) for each of the ladies.  Inside the box was a bag with mini chocolate cookies that my cousin made that said "eat me" and one of those wax soda bottle candies with a tag that said "drink me" on it.  We also found adorable pink flamingo lollipops.  We started with lunch and for food I had chicken salad croissants lettuce salad fruit kabobs that I stuck in a topiary with fruit dip cheese ball and crackers chips and dip keylime cupcakes with pastel frosting a Mad Hatter topsy turvey cake blueberry tarts pink lemonade and raspberry tea.  I kept the 2 Queen of Hearts cards from making the invitations and taped them to 2 lunch plates.  The ladies that had those plates recieved a copy of Alice in Wonderland storybook. 

After lunch I passed out lunch bags with our craft for the day.  Inside the bags were little white rabbits that I made from cheap gloves.  In the bag I included 2 button eyes a pink puff ball nose a little vest a pipe cleaner for the bow-tie and a little brass "pocket watch".  Around the table I had bottles of craft glue which worked just fine and let the ladies decorate their rabbits.  Kind of cheesy but they loved it! 

Then we proceeded to the front yard to play croquet.  I bought 10 yard flamingos from a website and wrapped their legs with ribbon to coordinate with the tennis ball that I spray painted to match.  It was a little bit more difficult than regular croquet but still fun.  After that the ladies just sat and talked which they are brilliant at.  It was such a fun party and Wonderland really isn't just for kids anymore!"

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