Nothing But Reading Challenges discussion

Hey guys, my friend and I are planning a graduation party and we're kind of at a stand still. So far 130 people are invited but more might show up because we have over 400 people graduating. I've never planned an event so something at this scale is kind of ming boggling. If you have any tips about food, themes, budgets, activities, decorations, etc...please post them here. They would be much appreciated!

Go to orientaltrading.com. They have decorations for all occasions and the majority of stuff you buy in bulk which would be perfect for a party of that size.

As far as food goes, I would say catering all the way. I would get plenty of parents and people to split that cost with you. It will be less stressful and in the long run cheaper than if you tried to do it all yourself. The initial cost might seem steep, but it is oh, so worth it.

Activities you can find online. There is a plethora of ideas. Maybe you could ask around and find a good, but reasonably cheap DJ in the area. I mean it is Miami after all. There should be gazillions of them.

I can tell you what NOT to do. I went to a graduation party a few years ago where the graduate's mom wanted to do something special for the graduate. The mom hit upon the idea of a surprise guest, and remembered that her daughter loved Captain Kangaroo when she was, like, three years old, so out of god knows where she found some old cast member from Captain Kangaroo and dragged him to the party. NOT making this up. The guy was 85 if he was a day. And by the time she sprung him on her daughter, the daughter was way too drunk to be graceful about the fact that she had NO idea who the guy was, NO memory of even having liked Captain Kangaroo, and no interest in this particular stroll down memory lane. It would have been funny if I hadn't felt so bad for the old guy.


I've thrown some pretty big parties. You have any idea what direction you want to head, food wise? I may be able to give you some simple, big batch recipes or ideas. And I have a recipe for Chathams Artillery Punch which makes 3 gallons or so, if you're looking for something alcoholic.

Where are you going to have the party? Someone's home? Rent a hall or rec center? Remember that a lot of places like rec centers require that you hire "X" number of police officers per so many people if you will be serving alcohol.

If you're having it at someone's house, you may need to rent tables and chairs. If you're not having it catered you'll need extra tables and stuff to serve food. The benefit to catering is that they'll usually bring all of the plates, glasses, utensils and take them away at the end of the evening.

How many families are involved? Could you divide up the items on a menu?

DJs in South Florida

Graduation Party Planning

Activity Ideas

Activities

Activities

Oh, Jennifer, that is horrible. LOL.

And as Shay was saying, a police officer or two or three probably wouldn't be a bad idea. I doubt your 130+ guests all love each other. THAT would be a miracle...

For the food thing, the first thing to do would be to get estimates. Well, the second thing. First, what "style" of eating- buffet or sit down? A full dinner or just snack foods/appetizers. Then call a caterer and ask them for a sample menu and the cost per person. Find out if they will supply the serving dishes, plates, etc. Then, you see if you can beat that price by doing it yourself. It may not be worth the effort to save a few bucks. It's not just the cooking it, it's the storing what you cook in advance, buying the food, transporting it, etc. It will also limit your menu to foods that don't spoil quickly. If you decide to cook, see if you can rent a facility that has a commercial kitchen. We threw a party once and rented an elementary school kitchen because they have all of the equipment and the huge refrigerators. We also were able to hire some of the ladies to come in and help prep- cutting vegetables for example, and do the dishes.

Sashana, Are people planning to pitch in for the cost? How fancy do you want this?

Food Possibilities:
Pizza - Ask stores sometimes they give deals for graduation parties. Around by us we sometimes get them for end of the year classroom parties. If ordering pizza sometimes you can ask them to slice it differently (cut 10 slices per pie instead of 8). This can stretch things.

Sandwiches: Ask local grocery store for prices and also sandwich stores. Don't be afraid to haggle with them on prices. Say your going around looking for the best deals. With that many people you'll need a lot of food so don't hesitate to ask for a discount for having a big order.

Check out restaurants that will cater or have party menus. Check restaurants for prices for food. Sometimes they are surprisingly reasonable. EXAMPLE: Last time I checked Moe's and Olive Garden had catering (Moe's) and a Parties to go menu (Olive Garden). They may be more reasonable then you imagine so see how much food you get and prices. You may need to order these in advance so don't wait till the last minute.

Cake - Check grocery stores and Bakeries. You may need more than one cake. They can give you prices and tell you approximately how much/many cake(s) you need.

Paper product (cups, plates, napkins, etc) - I'd go to BJ's, Sam's, Costco, etc for this. With any luck they might have your school colors.

My advice to you is try not to do too much yourself so you can enjoy your own graduation party.

I think you need to know how many people are comming. The amount of food you need for 130 people versus 400 will be huge. And it's no fun to run out of food at a party.

I would check out area pizza places. Many of them will cater hot and cold dishes, salads and bread and will deliver.

Another option is to hire a company that caters barbques. We've done that for parties. They brought everything but drinks.

Unless you have the room to prep and store everything it's going to be hard to cook for that many people.

Sandy wrote: "I think you need to know how many people are comming. The amount of food you need for 130 people versus 400 will be huge. And it's no fun to run out of food at a party.

I would check out area p..."

Yes, anytime you serve food you need an exact count. Isn't there some service online that does e-vites? It keeps track of who's RSVP'ed and can send reminders to those who haven't. Also send reminders for the party itself?

Sashana, is this a high school graduation, college, or something else? And is it a party just for that age or multigenerational? Please give us some more info on where you're having the party (or if you don't know yet) - indoor/outdoor, etc, and how long it's going for (don't forget to think about neighborhood noise complaints). And what is your budget?

And yes, evite is great but most people won't RSVP. You have to plan for double the number you get evite responses for, generally. Unfortunately if it's a graduation party that everyone knows about even more people may come who don't RSVP. Evite's still helpful, though, b/c people like to see who's coming so they know if they know people who will be there.

Thanks for the help everyone. Our parents kind of stepped back and handed most of the responsibly to us (not that we blame them) but we clearly didn’t think of a lot of stuff. I didn’t even think of who would be responsible for serving the food (thanks for bringing that up, Shay). I think we’ll do it buffet style. We planned to buy the plates and utensils from Party City but we saw that it was cheaper at Sam’s (thanks, Lisarenee). I will definitely try to work out some deals for a cake and some sandwiches too. Thanks for the website, Rachel (the activities were great). We’re still at a standstill about the theme but we’ll figure it out :)

*The party will be held in my friend’s yard. We’re thinking of renting a tent.

*So far 3 families are involved in the planning; mine, my friend’s, and her boyfriend.

*Our budget is about $1500 (all three families split the cost)

*My friend’s boyfriend’s family owns a party planning place and they offered up some chairs and tables for free.

*As for food we’re keeping it really casual mostly because we’re on a tight budget. Hot dogs, chicken wings, snow cones, cotton candy, popcorn, macaroni, pizza etc…We have machines to make the hot dogs, snow cones, cotton candy, and pop corn.

*One of our classmates is a DJ and he decided to do it for a low cost.

*We did the invites via Facebook since it was the quickest, cheapest, and most convenient method to RSVP. So far 60 people have.

*It a high school graduation party, Jan. It’s mostly for our peers but if their families want to tag along we have no problem.

Sounds like it will turn out nicely, Sashana! It looks like you are on the right track. I would love to be at a party that had snow cones, cotton candy, and macaroni! LOL. Seeing all that food makes me think of a carnival or state fair. That could be a theme, although I don't know if it would be "grown up" enough. Another cool idea would be a masquerade. Or since you have food that also makes me think of the movies, maybe an actress/actor costume party?

Or you could play off of your senior motto, Tshirts, etc. My graduating class' motto was "Free At Last". It really went two different directions. When they thought of it, they were thinking of jail-breaking. So, our senior shirts had a ball and chain and other graphics on it. A lot of people dressed up as prisoners and prison wardens for the party. The other half, the drama and band people mostly, took a totally different direction. They took "Free At Last" and related it to its original meaning from MLK Jr. It was quite an interesting combo...prisoners and people dressed up as MLK Jr. and political activists. Definitely a memory I will never forget...

Sashana,
Tent rentals are really!! expensive. I would come up with an alternative rain plan, like moving all of the furniture in the common areas of your home into bedrooms. (If you're expecting a big crowd, you should move anything breakable out of the common areas of the house anyway. Don't trust drunk teenagers! Remember the word will get out and there will be people there you don't know and shouldn't trust)

Music:
Does your DJ need you to rent equipment, or is he bringing his own speakers & amp, etc?
You may want to give the DJ a 'please don't play this song' list (one of the perks of being the organizers).
Make sure you have the equipment set up to run an ipod or something before the dj goes on.
Remember that after 10 or so you'll probably get noise complaints for an outdoor party with music - you'll probably need to move inside at some point.

Alocohol: If you are serving alcohol to teens (as most teen parties do) DON'T mention it online anywhere. This can screw the adults that live at that address.

If you aren't, you still have to plan for people being drunk = messy! Rope some friends into helping you clean up the morning after. And stock bathrooms with lots of extra toilet paper. And be very cautious about candles, any kind of open blame, many drunk teens haven't learned to be careful yet.

Food & drink: Sounds like you're ok, but don't forget to plan on having a stupid number of cups. (For more adult parties, I have a few sharpies out to have people label their cups so they don't use a million cups, but that doesn't work so well for outdoor parties, and I wouldn't trust drunken teens I don't know with sharpies around walls, furniture, etc.)
You may want to find those big sports water jugs for water. Why not make it easy for people to drink the free stuff? Powdered lemonade is also cheap.
Also have extra trash cans. Lots of people forget that.

Decorations:
Don't worry about activities- for that big of a crowd, all you need is food and music. Instead you might want to think about decorations. One of the easiest ways to give atmosphere is with christmas lights -maybe of your school colors?- for a night party or balloons for a day party. I also like to switch out all the lightbulbs for colored ones for an indoor party. Keep it simple with few elements of decoration and go for volume instead. You can always get creative with them. Making signs, etc can take a ton of time, so I'd give it a pass. You can do a theme if you want to, but don't worry if you don't have one- graduation is enough of a theme in and of itself.