Party on, Party People!

I’m a theme party kind of girl.  I get it from my mom.  When I throw parties, I go all out.  For my sister’s 30^th the theme was “Kid's Games” so we piled the tables high with everything from Mousetrap to Hungry Hippos and I spelled out ‘Happy Birthday’ on a Lite-Brite.  For the holidays one year we had a “Biergarten” themed party and I made about a hundred soft pretzels from scratch.  For my 21^st birthday, my roommates and I threw an “Awesome 80’s” party complete with 200 hot pink and black balloons on the ceiling of our living room.  You should see what I've pulled together for baby showers... and don’t even get me started on Halloween!

So when it came time to plan an Engagement Party for Mr. Palm Frond and me, there was no way I could stay out of the fun of planning it.  The first step?  Choosing a theme, of course.  

When my sister got engaged, we centered her party around Italian food and wine.  Picture giant antipasto platters and candles burning in vintage Chianti bottles.  It was lovely, and the food was fabulous.

I’ve gotten to the point where I like the food to be an integral part of the theme.  At some point in the party brainstorm, someone mentioned crawfish.  Cajun.  And then I started playing with words as I so often do.  Cajun... Ragin’ Cajun...  Ragin’ Cajun Celebration of Engagin.’  Boom!

I designed our invitations in Adobe Illustrator with artistic input from Mr. Palm Frond.  I had a cutesy alligator in an apron on them at first, but Mr. PF wanted something a little more fierce-looking, and this is what we came up with: 

I used Vistaprint.com to print them and they were mailed out in bright red envelopes.  We had a lot of friends say they thought it was the coolest Engagement Party invite ever!

I’ll post pictures from the party tomorrow.

So… who else digs theme parties?  I’d love to hear about some good ones!