Valentines Dance Party- Sucess!

The Valentines Day party I helped throw last Friday was a great success. We planned for 80 and about 75 people showed up.  To read about the food for the party you can read the post here.  We had just the right amount of pasta, way too much pasta sauce (6 gallons of sauce for 80 people is too much!), we had too much salad, and not quite enough bread ( I thought 8 cheesy bread pizzas would be oodles) and we made about 3 cakes too many.  It is my number one fear when planning an event to run out of food so I am totally fine with having too much food.


Planning a party for 80 people can be quite stressful, especially when things do not go according to plan.
It takes a lot of patience and the ability to adapt.  Speaking of adapting, we had to do some major adapting when the pasta sauce showed up 10 minutes before the party started COLD.  Yes, usually when you get food catered it is warm, but Pizza Pie Cafe forgot to mention that the sauce would not be warm.




So... we had to improvise.  Luckily we had a kitchen to heat up the food, but unfortunately we

did not have pots or pans to heat up the sauce
quickly.  We did have two ovens and about 20 stainless steel bowls.  We set the ovens to 350 degrees split up the sauces and began the warming process.

One thing I love about throwing a party is delegating.  When was dealing with the pasta fiasco I had about 5 people ask me what they could do to help.  I was able to have them take care of the little things while I figured out what to do with the pasta sauce.

We were also very lucky to have a DJ at the party to help cover up for us while the sauce got warm.  They played a version of Battle of the Sexes.  It was pretty funny to see the husband and wife's reaction to each others answers.  

We decorated for the party using Wedding pictures of from guests at the party.  I think it was a great/ cheap way to decorate when you have a large group of good friends.  We also dimmed the lights to create a mood and put some lights up.  It is hard to make a church cultural hall look good on a budget and with limited resources, but I do think this was a nice addition.

Food: Better than whatever cake, Salad, Pasta, Cheesy pizza bread.  ( we are still waiting for the sauce to get warm)

Out DJ was awesome.  After everyone was done eating he began the dance.  He started by telling all the husbands that they needed to come line up before the dance started.  Then he told the wives to get up and stand by their husbands and then start dancing.  It was awesome because we all knew the husbands would not dance unless they were forced to.

3 year old love birds Lily and Jacob!

My husband had to work so Lily was my Valentine that night.  We danced together.  I also got to be the "babysitter" while mom and dad danced.  I love holding babies and man does it make me hungry for one of my own.

The key to a good party is to:

1.Relax

2.delegate 

3.do not let the little things bother you.  

4. Make sure you enjoy the party as well. 

Planning a large party can be real tough, but enjoy and have fun!

Party on!

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