When I decided to give in to everyone else’s insistence and read this crazy wildstorm called The Hunger Games, I knew I would be totally in love with the entire series/franchise forever. I became like a peddler, out handing my copies of the series around, asking all of my friends, “Have you read it yet? Come on, read it, you know you want to” and finally, all of my friends succumbed to my peer pressure and ended up just like me – in love with Katniss Everdeen, district 12, and the downfall of the Capitol.
I was the only one of my group of friends who had read the book in time to catch the movie in theatre. One day, at Aquafit class, my friend Jenn said, “We should all watch the movie together. I know, we should have a Hunger Games viewing party!”
Now she was talking my language. (Just to clarify, my language would be anything involving a party, and definitely anything involving the Hunger Games.)
That was about two months ago, and I have been planning little details ever since. And I am beyond thrilled with how it turned out. My friends were amazed, which is always my goal, and one friend said “I will seriously be talking about this party on my death bed.” Yes, my friends do like to overdramatize, but it was a pretty awesome time.
Wanna see how it all turned out? Here you go! (Please keep in mind that it was evening in my basement – natural light was hard to come by, and even my basement doesn’t have a lot of light. The pics are slightly underexposed, but I think they turned out well enough to enjoy!)
This one is very dark, just to show you the mood/ambience of the place. Don’t you love that little campfire? I borrowed it from our youth pastor at church after they used it for VBS.
I turned the lights on to take a few shots, but they are still a little underexposed. Here’s a picture of the overall tablescape.
I made the banner for the front myself, using the GIMP program.
I didn’t want to go to literal with the food – sure we could have ate squirrel or lamb stew or goat and apple tarts, but (a) I didn’t want to, and (b) I wanted to be more creative then that. So our menu?
– Caesar Flickerman salad cups (mini casear salads served in a cheese cup, so the whole thing was edible)
– Basil, bacon, and goat cheese log (made with goat cheese from Prim’s goat, Lady) served with “Peeta bread”
– Haymitch’s drunken shrimp (marinated in a rum mixture then wrapped with proscuitto and grilled)
-Nightlock Pavlova Parfaits (pavlova, whipped cream, and “nightlock” berries)
– District 12’s Coal Truffles (oreo and cream cheese mixed together, then dipped in chocolate and sprinkles)
For beverages, I created a Sleep Syrup – which was really just blackberry/raspberry sparkling lemonade. I also created matching water bottle labels and napkin rings, that said “Happy Hunger Games”. I kept the patterns the same throughout the whole set up (red stripes and golden yellow chevron). I also created the yellow chevron menu cards to complete the set.
I framed some art for the backdrop. The middle print was one that I created myself, and it is part of the propaganda speech in the video from the Capitol on Reaping Day. The other two I downloaded from Risa Rodil, a graphic artist who has created tons of Hunger Games artwork.
For the rest of the backdrop, I made these fire poms and hung them from the ceiling. I also hung parachutes, which were filled with a bottle of sleep syrup and a bun from District 11. I printed some more Capitol propaganda and framed them, and placed them alongside an apple with an arrow through it. I used a lot of mason jars because they seemed to fit the idea of District 12 in my head. I’m sure they reused as much as they could and couldn’t afford fancy glasses. I filled the mason jars half way with sand, then placed small triangles of red, orange, and yellow tissue paper on top of the sand to look like flames. (It was actually the pieces cut off the fire pom tips.) Then I placed the arrows (dowels with feathers glued on) into the mason jars. Finally, I wrapped some twine around the jars.
The small frames held quotes from the book, and there were little tags with character names on it. My friends matched the quote to the character who said it – they did pretty good too, 5/7 on the first try.
Anyway, I think that’s about it for my Hunger Games party… but also check out these links with other projects I did to prepare for the party:
The Hunger Games Wreath that I hung on my front door for the party. |
The t-shirt that I wore at the party, created with freezer paper and bleach. |
The Hunger Games trivia game that we played at the party. |
Kim @ The Sasse Life says
This is awesome! I’m sure everyone loved it. Would love for you to share this at my link party. Hope to see you there!
http://www.thesasselife.com/2012/09/crafty-sasse-wednesday-link-party-45.html
Kim