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Family Matters:  Birthday Party for My Parents--help please  |
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Tidy Aprons
True Blue Farmgirl
99 Posts
Oney Farmgirl #638
Colorado
USA
99 Posts |
 Posted - Jun 25 2009 : 08:10:50 AM
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Ladies,
My parents will be celebrating their 60th birthdays in July. My brother and I want to give them a surprise birthday party. Do you have any unique, grand, fun, or otherwise appropriate ideas for the couple? Their birthdays are 3 days apart. They are farmers/ranchers and hard workers. They deserve a nice party but are not into froo-froo, KWIM? I'm looking for some simple, down home fun.
Thanks in advance!
~Oney~
"There's something a little holy in taking care of the places we inhabit, in summoning sheen. And there's a power in watching over our spaces, the rooms we move within, the sets where our life stories unfold." ~Lori Hall Steele |
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gramadinah
True Blue Farmgirl
3557 Posts
Diana
Orofino
ID
USA
3557 Posts |
Posted - Jun 25 2009 : 08:48:47 AM
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How about after church. We had cake and ice cream at the church.
Diana
Farmgirl Sister #273 |
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FebruaryViolet
True Blue Farmgirl
4810 Posts
Jonni
Elsmere
Kentucky
USA
4810 Posts |
Posted - Jun 25 2009 : 09:11:04 AM
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What fun!!! I love a party, especially for something so special! I like Diana's idea for utilizing a church if you can...what about a neighbor's barn or land or something?
This is what I did for my husband's milestone birthday (30)...he'd never had a party really before, because he spent most of his years in a boys home. So, I wanted to make something memorable for him, but we're not fancy folks, either.
To make it a surprise, after compiling my list of friends from all parts of his life (even elementary school!), I sent invitations to all on the guestlist with all the particulars (where, when, etc...) and to our house, I mailed (with his grandmother's handwriting) an invite to a 50th Wedding Anniversary Party for some good friends/might as well be family of his grandparents, instructing the same time, place, etc.. of the birthday party. What a foil! And to this day he will say how suprised he was, and that he had NO idea...and from the look on his face, I know he didn't!
I already had many brightly colored vintage tablecloths, and went to the thrift and bought all kinds of cheap white milkglass vases for Zinnia's for the table decorations (I grew some of the zinnias and bought some at the farmers market, so cheap...) I bought chinese lanterns and hung them from the rafters of the Edwardian band-shell where we held the party, at his family's 1900's era "camp" with all these little victorian summer cottages. So, the theme sortof became 1940's-1950's summertime social, I guess, without much trying!
Out of a large antique Victorian frame that I got at a yard sale, I made a "memory board" with pics from infancy to most recent, the last being a wedding picture--you could do individual memory boards for them or one together, since everything is so close together for them!
Everyone brought a dish and set up the long tables with more food than you could ever imagine! We used paper plates and plastic cups and flatware, because there was no sink where we were, and I got the cake from the same maker of our wedding cake so it would be really special. I had 4 galvinized metal tubs (like washtub size) filled with ice and Ale 8 (a Kentucky soda, and my husband's favorite), along with all the Stewart's bottle soda's, so you could maybe do something like that...little cokes in bottles, or rootbeers and cream sodas? The colors of the soda's alone in the bottles made for enough decoration, and looked so refreshing on such a hot summer day!
There was already a horseshoe pit set up, and regionally, here, there is a game called "Corn Hole" that everyone plays (like an adult bean bag toss) so all the men and kids ended up over where the pit and game boards were set up.
I can honestly say it did take some planning, and it was VERY covert, but it was the best party I've ever thrown and he and his family still talk about it! He was so happy, and the pictures that were taken that day just take me right back.
Good luck! Keep posting and hopefully we can help!
Musings from our family in the Bluegrass http://sweetvioletmae.blogspot.com/ |
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JessieMae
True Blue Farmgirl
702 Posts
Jessie
Raleigh
North Carolina
USA
702 Posts |
Posted - Jun 29 2009 : 07:53:36 AM
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We host a lot of anniversary parties at the club where I work, and those digital slideshows of scanned pictures with background music seem to be a big hit. Also, using or bringing their old wedding gifts is pretty popular. Like, drinking out of the glasses they used at their reception, cutting the cake with the same knife, making a replica wedding cake, etc.
Jessie Mae
Farmgirl Sisterhood #134 |
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JessieMae
True Blue Farmgirl
702 Posts
Jessie
Raleigh
North Carolina
USA
702 Posts |
Posted - Jun 29 2009 : 07:54:51 AM
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Ooops...I'm an idiot. I thought your parents were celebrating their 60th anniversary. Sorry.
Jessie Mae
Farmgirl Sisterhood #134 |
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Family Matters: Birthday Party for My Parents--help please |
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Birthday Party for My Parents--help please
