Party of the year!

Mom and Dad celebrated 30 years of marriage on November 24th. My brothers, Derrick, and I decided before their last anniversary that we wanted to throw them an anniversary party for a couple of reasons. First off, it's so rare to make it to 30 years and we wanted to celebrate that. Secondly, they are a true example of what we all want for our own marriages and we appreciate them so much for paving that path for us. And finally, it would be a fun reason to get everybody they love together in one place. So, the idea was sprung over a year ago and we brainstormed our vision until it was time to implement it.

Since the party was right after Thanksgiving I emailed out a save the date email to hopefully encourage people to wrap up their Thanksgiving plans in time for the party and invitations went out about 5 weeks before the party. Since the 30th anniversary is the pearl anniversary that is where we were going with the theme but all of the pearl-themed invitations looked like they should be used for their 100th anniversary (read...old!!) so I found this really fun invitation and played off the sparkle and glitter for the rest of the decor.

Jay, Jack, Derrick and I were in constant contact organizing the guest list, catering from their favorite restaurant, brainstorming activities for the evening, and planning our surprise plan. My Mom's brothers were even able to come up for the weekend claiming that they were already going to be half-way to NC over Thanksgiving and they hadn't visited in forever. If my Mom was suspicious of anything she thought it was going to be earlier in the weekend. I ended bringing my Dad in on the plan because we couldn't pull it off without him and I knew my mom would appreciate the surprise and my Dad would appreciate the heads up. We filled him in on as few details as possible just telling him that we needed him to get mom dressed up and out of the house on Sunday afternoon and bring her back at 5:15. Luckily the movie Interstellar is almost 3 hours long! It provided the perfect excuse!

On Sunday morning we all said our goodbyes. We tried to tier our goodbyes so we didn't all leave at the same time but we were all gone by 11:45. We met at the grocery store down the street and then split up with our tasks. Derrick and I were in charge of flowers and appetizer shopping. Jay and Adnan were in charge of beer and ice. Jack and Nabeel were in charge of removing the dogs and picking up the rental tables and chairs. Dad texted me when the coast was clear and we descended on the house to whip it into shape in 4.5 hours.

This included re-locating the fully decorated Christmas tree, removing all of the living room furniture and creating a lounge in the dining room, setting up appetizers and drink stations, and setting up tables and chairs and all decorations. We were busy for the full 4.5 but the timing was actually perfect. We finished just as the first guests came down the driveway!

Figuring out the layout of the tables and chairs was one of the hardest parts. I'm so glad Jay took the lead on that because it stressed me out a little bit. It ended up perfectly.

I love this banner I made. I played off of the circles from the invitation and just used a circle hole punch and about 15-20 sheets of scrapbook paper in varying shades of white with a few glitter ones thrown in. Then I just sewed varying lengths of circles together. It turned out way better then I was expecting and really made a big impact.

Derrick's Mom and Grandma are saints! They made the cake pops for desert and arrived early to help make the appetizers and be on hand for anything else we needed.

Jay and Jack had the idea of spreading all the old photos out on the island and I had the idea of putting the glass from Mom and Dad's coffee table over top to protect the photos. It was one of my favorite elements of the decorations.

When everybody arrived I had them make a pit stop in the photo booth that we created so Mom and Dad could have record of everybody who came! Here are just a few of my favorites.

I swear the timing was perfect. The house got prepared just as people arrived and then all the guests arrived within about 10 minutes of each other. Dad texted when they were about 5 minutes out so we gathered everybody around for the surprise and man was mom surprised!

We weren't sure if Mom was going to be surprised or not but having it on a Sunday was the best thing we could have done. She was positive we had all gone home and wasn't expecting a thing. It was perfect!! The catering arrived shortly after and dinner commenced!

Remember those candle holders I made for Thanksgiving? Totally for this party actually...they just happened to be perfect for Thanksgiving too.

When dinner was wrapping up we started our first game. Derrick worked on this slide show for about 3 hours over the course of the previous nights and it was perfect! We found photos of Mom and Dad from the beginning of their marriage through present day. Each slide had a photo or two and a fact or two from that year and the guests had to guess what year it was. It was a really big hit!

You would think Mom and Dad would have had this in the bag...nope! I think they got about 60% right :)

To end the night Jay led mom and dad through the shoe game. Mom and Dad sat back to back and Jay would ask questions like: "who wanted the most kids" and "who has gotten the most speeding tickets". Mom and Dad each had one of Mom's shoes and one of Dad's shoes and they had to raise the shoe of the person who they thought answered the question. It was hilarious and a fun way to end the night.

 I am so so happy with how everything turned out. I feel like I always have these huge impossible visions and most things I do typically fall short. Still good, but just not the huge vision I had. This party was exactly the vision that we had and I think everyone had a great time. We were so, so happy to do this for Mom and Dad. If anyone deserves it, they do!

Thanksgiving in Hickory

After spending Thanksgiving Day in Morrisville Derrick and I drove to Hickory to spend some time with my family. My uncles and cousin from Florida came for the weekend to visit so we started the weekend out with a few drinks by the new fire pit my dad built.

This firepit is truly incredible. It started out as a sloped bank of dead plants and Dad leveled it and created the most beautiful space. By Hand. By Himself. It's incredible.

The next morning was the annual tree hunt up in the mountains. This year we had to take three cars and we were on the road by 9:00 so we could be back in time for football. It was the largest group we've ever taken so we were really crammed into the hayride.

Julie doesn't get to see a lot of snow in Florida so she was thrilled to be able to have a snowball fight.

 

Then of course, we stopped by Myras in Valdese. It's become a tradition to stop here every year and my family never passes up a tradition.

That night Nikki and Justin came over for games. I miss having her in Raleigh but I love knowing she'll always be in Hickory when I'm in town!

 

Derrick won all the games....typical.

1st Thanksgiving in Morrisville

This year Derrick and I hosted Thanksgiving in our house. It was a good motivator to get the house ready for such a big event only 2 months after moving in and I have to say I loved having it here. It was great having the space to host it and I loved having our house filled with people and activity. Derrick's Mom and Grandma came up on Tuesday night to help which was a HUGE life saver. I don't know how to make Thanksgiving dinner. I definitely needed help.

We braved the new Publix on Wednesday morning and came back to get our cook on. Pies first! We encountered our first problem when the oven caught on fire right after we put the pies in. Seriously! We saved the pies, let the fire burn itself out and then we had to set our oven on self clean to get the grease from the previous owners out. The self clean took 4.5 hours!! Total setback.

We were able to get some other preparations done while we were waiting though.

This thing is dangerous but awesome. Slices onions just as well as it slices Meemaw's finger...

That night we had a special visit from CK and Irene! I was so happy to have them come visit! They are long time friends of ours that moved to Baltimore and we have missed them. We had a great time showing them the house, eating CK's home made chocolate pie, and keeping the dogs from their sibling rivalry.

The next day was Thanksgiving and fires number two and three! One was a simple oven mit getting too close to the burner. No biggie, Derrick's mom put it out without me even knowing about it. The second though was when the turkey was in the oven! I finally managed to get a picture!

I wanted to try to combine the super formal Thanksgiving dinner that I was used to with the more casual Thanksgiving that Derrick was used to so I went for a casual sit down dinner. I covered the table with brown paper and wrote "I Am Thankful For..." in crayon on top of it. Then we just used flowers, candles, and crayons to decorate the table. I love how it turned out!

 

And at the end of the night it looked like this.

Here's some other pictures from a fun day!

This was adorable. The kids were teaching Ellie about technology.

This was our turkey timer. It gobbled when the turkey was ready!

Derrick hadn't carved a turkey before but I told him that was the male host's job so he took it on and did a great job!

This girl got her first taste of mashed potatoes and I think she liked it!

Thanksgiving this year was awesome! I loved hosting and hope to do it again! Hope yours was just as good!