As we start edging toward a new decade in our life, many people find themselves feeling anxious over their past ten years. Where does society say I should be at this point in my life? I say to heck with all of that jibberish….just enjoy where you are. Every year has highs and lows….let’s celebrate the “death” of one decade and happily move on to the next. That’s exactly what we did when planning the 30th birthday party for our daughter, Karleigh.
Death to My 20s ~
Yes, this was the theme for celebrating our beautiful girl. We are not saying death to the 20s because they were bad years…quite the contrary. The past decade has been a great one for her. However, now it is time to celebrate the new decade ahead. She’s engaged to the man of her dreams, is living in her dream home, and is the happy mommy of an adorable corgi…Theodore Ruffsavelt or better known as “Teddy.” I can only imagine what beautiful things the 30s have in store for her.
30th Birthday Party Decorations ~
Those of you who know us, know we love Halloween. We were SO excited to get the Halloween decorations out in July!!!! Side note: I think my neighbors got a bit nervous when they saw me pulling the skeleton heads out in the yard to paint them…🤣) I looked online first for gold skeleton heads and quickly realized that it would be easy and much less expensive to DIY them.
If you are a Halloween junkie like me, you will already have a bunch of skeleton heads hanging around. If not, you can easily get some online or if in season, hit up your local Dollar Store. Buy the cheapest ones you can find. Even though I did not need to buy any, I took the liberty to check online for you. PLEASE BE AWARE of size of the skulls you purchase. They all look the same size in the pictures but vary A LOT when you look at the details.
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The ones pictured above seem to be about the best price I could find for the size. These are 4.3″ tall, which is a great size. You can obviously buy smaller ones as well to paint and place around various locations of your party area. I had this tall stack of skulls that I haven’t used for years (I’m so glad my craft hoarding self held on to it 😉). It will serve as a new Halloween decoration to use this year after the party…and I love it!
I used the spray paint below. This is a bit more of an expensive paint than I would normally use for a project like this, but I am including it so you can see the color I used (Metallic Champagne Bronze). I will say that now that the project is complete, I’m glad I used the nicer paint because I will be using these fun skulls in my Halloween decor for years to come.
We normally like to DIY most of our party decor, but we were in a time crunch so several were purchased.
Skelly the Skeleton ~
Skelly is very loved in our family. He visits the kids the whole month of October bringing them various surprises. Check out one of my earlier posts about Skelly here! For the party, Skelly got to make an early visit this year, intact with a gold boa. He made for a great backdrop for the pictures.
The Coozies ~
Lauren got to work on her Cricut and made these awesome can coolers. Karleigh’s 30th is adorned on one side while a skelton head is on the other. Of course, these are done in black and gold to match the color theme. These turned out amazing and were a big hit! A perfect party favor for the guests to take home at the end of the party.
If you are a crafter and don’t own a Cricut, you are missing out! A true game changer!!! They aren’t cheap…but I promise you in time they save money for all of the items you purchase that you could be making yourself.
The Shades ~
Another fun party favor offered were the shades. Sunglasses are always a welcome take home gift. Of course, for this soiree, we had shades in gold and black! I created the cards in Canva, punched a hole in the corner and affixed them to each set with a black ribbon.
The Tablescape ~
A tiered tray was the centerpiece holding all of Karleigh’s favorite cookies, fudge and candies. Addi even jumped in on the party prep by making various flavor candy skeleton heads and tombstones. We then scattered the party favors, gold feathers, and random gold skulls atop black sheer material and black lighted garland. I had purchased this garland for my home decor last fall and had a very hard time finding what I wanted. The link is included below to save you the time I spent…whew! I was obsessed!
Food & Drink ~
We were trying to decide between theme-oriented food or going with some of the birthday girl’s favorites. The favorites won out so there was a nice spread of brisket, mashed potatoes, scalloped corn, meatballs, summer salad, watermelon and apps. Mint juleps were the drink of choice. Had we had more time, I definitely would have made something like this…Charcuterie board fun by outintherealworld.com. I love all of the creative ways people are finding to serve charcuterie boards.
I have included many more links than I normally do. If you are anything like me, you see some crafty ways to entertain that you love and then spend the next 24 hours trying to locate all the goods. I have mentioned before that I do make a small commission if you purchase from these links so I do TRULY appreciate your support of my small business. However, whether you purchase from them or not, I hope they serve helpful in locating items and then at least you know what they are called so you can do more searching on your own! Sometimes just knowing what an item is called is the biggest battle!
In Closing ~
This was a super fun party theme that we enjoyed putting together as much as the guests enjoyed being a part of. The painting of skeleton heads is super easy while the coozies definitely took more time…so plan wisely. I believe that a party should be as much fun to plan as it is to attend. A memorable party always consists of good food and drink, fun decorations, nice party favors and a good picture backdrop.
Enjoy!
Love ~
Mimi
