{from jeSsiCa}

Well folks, here it is…one of my favorite birthday parties ever! Hosted by yours truly, QuteHoots of course!!! 😀 Last month we celebrated the start of my fab-tastic thirties with a craZy fun-filled Mad Hatter tea party. Man oh man did we have an amazing time. Ranai and I have been working on it for quite some time now, and we are SO very happy about how it turned out!

This is part 1 of our Mad Hatter festivities and as you can see…we had a GREAT time! Our first and foremost condition for this party was: you MUST dress up! And of course, we did 😀

The occasion allowed us to finally throw a gathering we’ve had in the works for a while…a tea party! We were able to have this outside, which added to the Alice in Wonderland tea party feel, and the weather was amazing. We had 30-35 guests coming so we used 10-6ft. tables to get just the right amount of space for decorations and well, the food!

For table decor, we knew we wanted to go all out! I love everything fun, bright and colorful so we really focused on happy, lively colors for the party. We got most of the pieces from thrift stores and yard/estate sales we visited, although some tea pots and tea cup sets came from our moms, grandmas, mother in laws and anyone we could think of that might have had some cool treasures hidden away! The main items we looked for were tea pots, tea cups and saucers, vases and unique bottles…anything that screamed Mad Hatter Tea Party 🙂 

The dessert table and set up was really Ranai’s project for this party and man did she knock it out of the park! We had a beautiful birthday banner and the cutest cupcake toppers ever! After throwing this fabulous party we really did conclude that for any themed party…it’s really all in the details! From “Drink Me” tags, to tea pot toppers, Alice in Wonderland quotes and googly eyes on flowers…it’s so important to take the details into consideration and really get into it!

For yard decorations we knew that we had to have a croquet set. Not only is it spot on with the movie [Don’t mess with the Queen!] but it is a great way to get your guests to interact with each other and have some fun, friendly competition. In addition to this we made some fun signs to let guests know where the party was and lead them to the party area- fun and functional! We have a beautiful willow tree in my parent’s backyard so we thought paper lanterns would be a great way to add some color and fun to that section of the yard. It permitted the “party area” to extend further than just the table/seating area to include the furthest part of the yard. It was very eye catching and  also allowed the Cheshire Cat to make his subtle appearance at our function…more on that on posts to come!

Themed parties can be a lot of work but we promise, it’s fun and SO worth it. This is the first blog in our Mad Hatter Tea Party blog series so come back and check out our next posts where we give you tips, tricks and SO many ideas for your future tea parties, regular or a little Mad!