Mad Hatter Tea Party

I turned 35 this year. I have no problem saying my age. Why should I feel bad about not being in my 20s anymore? It makes no sense to me. I have some wrinkles and my hair is starting to gray (which I'm actually really excited about; gray/silver/white hair is beautiful).

I decided to throw myself a big birthday party. We usually do small family get-togethers to celebrate adult birthdays, but I wanted a big party: I wanted to feel like I had a lot of friends, even though we've been here less than 10 months, and we're moving again next week.

It was during the preparation for this party  that I had my genius idea that I wrote about a few weeks ago. Yup. I threw myself a Mad Hatter Tea Party. Most of the ideas I used for the party were ideas I found on Pinterest. (I love Pinterest. I mean, really love it.) I knew it would be an open house style party- I wanted it to be relaxed, but fun.

First is first: what will it look like? I gathered several tables from family and friends and made a huge long table with different colored table covers topped with lace tablecloths (we ended up using lace curtains... Which I think added to the feel of the whole thing. Then, I printed out some fun Alice in Wonderland pictures and quotes and put them in Dollar Tree frames- sort of matchy, but all different. I found some cute little hand mirrors that I thought would be appropriate since I would watch "Alice Through the Looking Glass" the night before the party. I also picked up some easels to hold a couple giant pocket watches (made by printing large images, gluing them to foam board and crocheting or finger knitting the "chain"). 

The table had lots of mini things to eat on trays (mostly from the Dollar Tree and Walmart), 3 different drinks to choose from: pink lemonade, orange slush, and water bottles in ice. I found these cute tags to use both on the table, and around the table:

Then, the question became: What are we going to do? I didn't want people to get bored... But I'm not the biggest fan of planned "party games"- where everyone is forced to play even if they don't want to. Pinterest, again, came to my rescue- this is what I found:

AND, I remembered that my parents still had a croquet set from my childhood. So, I set that up, and grabbed a bunch of art/craft supplies- and made an entire table devoted to decorating hats. I made the basic hats using plastic cups (I admit the paper ones look more like hats, but I got the plastic ones for cheaper, got a whole lot more for my money- and it came in 4 different colors). I cut circles for the bottom, cut slits to hold the headband (which came from Amazon for super cheap), and glued the cup to the paper. They were a huge hit!

And as far as the photo props were concerned, I decided not to do them. We weren't sure if the weather would even let us be outside, and if that was the case, we wouldn't have room for the photo booth- and I was already starting to stress about having everything ready (and perfect) in time. But when a friend heard about the idea, she ran out and bought a foam board so I would at least make a frame. It didn't take too long. In addition, my mom loaned me a giant caterpillar, and I had way too many giant pocket watches to just put on the table. So, I printed an image of the Cheshire Cat, and put these all in a tree.

Not only was the day clear and sunny (until the second we finished clean-up), but some of my absolute favorite people came! It all turned out great. There were times I wondered if anyone would even come... I doubt myself like that... In the end, though, I was pretty spoiled.