Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Summer Soiree


A couple weekends ago we had a party for all of Eric's employees in our backyard for a bit of an end of summer bash. Eric has hired a lot of new employees over the past 6 months so we thought it would be fun to have a big family for us to get to know all the new wives and families as well as hang out with all of the work families we already know and love. I have actually been having it in the works since May (but since summer was so busy we didn't schedule it until August.) I wanted to go with the "semi trendy" carnival theme and it was too much fun to plan. Tried to keep it around the fun colors, red, white, yellow and tiffany blue, and kind of make it more of the old fashioned carnival look. Don't these colors just make you happy?

{the invite}

I am loving doing the custom Jones soda wrappers for everything lately. Eric has a little contest at the office with a "surprise" for the 8 winners. They were the ones who were featured on the Jones sodas for the party.


Since Eric's employee count has gone up, it's getting harder and harder for us to do all the food prep so for this party, so I used {and am now in love with} the fan-tabulous caterers Culinary Crafts. Holy smokes, their food was amazing, they were so great to work with, and the servers etc were so nice and so helpful. And aren't they cute that they wore ties to match the tiffany blue colors we used.

The food was even better than it looked and I loved the great punch, berry bongo and lemonade bar they did. They were so great at making everything I wanted happen with the food. We tried to stick with the "fair food" theme. They grilled up hot dogs and gourmet burgers with every topping you could imagine, we also had pasta salad, roasted potatoes, french fries in parchment cones, fresh fruit, salsa bar. Delish!


We also did an old fashioned candy bar... remember some of these candies?? Oldies but goodies! Also we had a sundae bar with tons of ice cream topping and cotton candy.


Right along with the carnival idea, I had the great face painter I used at Ady's birthday party come to do face painting and she brought a balloon twisting sidekick which the kids loved. We also had a couple other fun carnival games for the tons of kids who came.

{the carousel animals made for both cute decor as well as great picture spots for the kiddos... and adults who act like kiddos}

The week before the party, we had Eric's loan officers vote on who got to dunk Eric in the dunk tank, as well as nominations for who the LO's wanted to get to dunk and who the girls in the office wanted to dunk.


Most of the kids swam and fountain played too. Then the daddies started a belly flop and diving contest. Eric works with the most competitive guys ever. Everything always ends up being a contest.


Eric and I kept stealing the microphone for from the DJ and emcee-ing for ourselves, we gave out some fun raffle prizes who got donated from Skullcandy and some other fun places.

But the best part of the party, was spending time with all the great people who came. Eric is so lucky to have such great employees who we love to hang out with.


And our favorite local photographer and our friend Ashlee Raubach was hires to do all the pics for the evening {including all these I posted} and she also set up a little photo booth so we could get some fun group shots and family shots of everyone.


I know this blog post was so long but this party was so much fun and I loved getting totally into the carnnival. Thanks everyone who came!

27 comments:

becky said...

oh my! i love every detail of this! great pics!

Melanie Posell said...

I want to be an employee, but just for the parties. OK? Looks like so much fun!

evelania said...

What a fun party! I would LOVE to do this, it must have been so much fun planning!!! Everything looks so fun and vibrant, glad it turned out so great.

Jen Tornow said...

AMAZING! Great job!

Jill said...

OH MY WORD. hailey this party is incredible. i love the colors and the striped tablecloths. you seriously know how to throw a party down to every detail.

Alicia said...

Wow girl... looks like fun!! You do amazing work!!

Jason and Amy said...

SERIOUSLY? seriously?SERIOUSLY? by far my favorite super amazing magical party done by the very talented hailey kandell. wow.

The Petersons said...

This is AWESOME Hailey! Great job on everything!

Timothy & Kimberly Pettitt said...

I love this idea! I have been planning on doing the carnival theme for my oldest son's b-day...it won't be as cute as yours, but you gave me a few additional ideas! Thanks!

Danielle said...

I love it! So gorgeous and looks like everyone had so much fun. :)

jaanderson family said...

so cute hailey! we just did a carnival themed party for ryleighs birthday party! guess its in the air!

Whitney Palmer said...

You are really amazing! wish i worked for Eric, so many perks!

Love it all! and you're a great photographer!

Lisa said...

Hailey!!! You really know how to throw a party! I love the idea and everything you did!

Don't be surprised if Eric gets a load of applications in the next couple of days! ;)

whitney holland. said...

Looks like a childhood dream!

whitney holland. said...

p.s. do you do the pictures side by side in photobucket? I can never figure it out when editing in blog mode.

Jen Bird said...

Ahh! That's the best looking carnival I've seen! It beats any I've been to! What a fabulous party thrower you are!! I mean seriously!

Partyof9 said...

Your parties could seriously be ranked right up there with those in Hollywood.

You do amazing work!

Amber Lynn said...

How fun!!! Your amazing~ what fun memories

Darbee said...

Oh Hailey! Everything is amazing... seriously! I LOVE every little creative detail! You truly are so good at what you do! Absolute Perfection!

stacy h. said...

there you go again....pulling off something amazing!
oh and culinary crafts did our wedding dinner. you're right, SO good!

Anonymous said...

Can your parties be any more perfect? Love it. And if you decide to be an event coordinator someday, I will hire you in a heartbeat. Question. What company did you use for your carnival tents? I am looking for some for my sister's baby shower coming up in October that is carnival themed.

Tiffany said...

It was such a blast to be there. Thanks for all the good events. You chose Tiffany blue just for me right? Is there a Halloween costume party in the making?

Magdalena said...

Love the colors, and yes, they do make me happy. Once again, you look so cute in the pics and the teeny details are what made this so great to look through - you truly have a rare talent for this. Excellent work cyber friend ;)

Katie and Matt said...

Thank you so much for the amazing party, it's so nice to have our husbands recognized for all of their hardwork! You also sure know how to throw a jaw dropping "soiree"....wow...

Larsen said...

Sister, you've got a serious talent! That looks like it was so much fun. cute pics.

What Karen Sees said...

Now this should have been the Webster's Dictionary definition for 'party'. Absolutely every detail to make sure your guests had a 'funtabulous' evening! It is so fun having your cute family as our neighbors. It keeps is thinking young!!!!

Laura Essig said...

I love those pics of Ben and LaCole!!! they are so cute... max and addy are sooo adorable!!