The holiday season is an overwhelming time for many people. The pressure to get your home in tip-top shape for all of the parties and festivities to come can make celebrating the season feel less relaxing and more like a chore. Luckily, with careful planning, you can throw a gathering that is as enjoyable as it is beautiful.
Take a look at our 5 easy planning tips for hosting your holiday parties this year:
Decide on a Theme for Your Party
Your theme will provide the inspiration for everything from the decor to the menu. For Thanksgiving parties, the theme is usually the harvest, but winter celebrations could have snowy themes, traditional Christmas concepts, or any number of other ideas. You could host a movie-themed Christmas party, an ugly sweater party, or a party geared toward the kids.
Once you’ve decided on a theme, you can start making a to-do list for your party. You can also decide how formal you’d like your gathering to be. Should you have place cards? Do you want to send paper invitations to guests or just post the invite on social media? There are many websites available online to create unique party invitations that could also serve as a memorable party keepsake for your family.
Once you decide on a theme, go ahead and start making a to-do list to make it easier to remember all of the little details about your party that you don’t want to forget.
Plan the Menu Around Your Party Theme
If you’re having a wintry Christmas party, you might have a hot cocoa bar or snowflake cookie making station for your guests. Ugly sweater cookie making kits are also popular. Beyond themed desserts, you can serve finger foods and appetizers that pair well with your theme, too. Think Snowman cheeseballs or Grinch fruit skewers using grapes, marshmallows, and strawberries. You could even encourage your guests to each bring a food for a potluck style party. If you’re planning a more formal party, select a style of cuisine that fits your theme. Explore online or flip through an old school recipe book for new and traditional ideas.
Prepare Your Home for the Party
When it comes to preparing your home for your gathering, the biggest tip is to start early. If possible, use the week before the party to deep clean your house to your specifications and prepare for guests. This way, you can take the time wash baseboards, clean cabinets, and refresh fabric drapes. Use a vacuum cleaner attachment brush and a feather duster to clean your interior plantation shutters, followed by a natural or homemade furniture polish. The day of the party, you can make a simmer pot. Let pine, apple cider, cinnamon, and other ingredients simmer in a pot on the stove to give the house that special wintry smell. For an autumn or Thanksgiving simmer pot, try combining ingredients like vanilla, orange peel, cinnamon, and apple.
Consider the Decorations
Just like with your menu, use your theme to guide your decorating. Your decorations could be simple, involving basic decor, like themed table cloths, holiday wreaths, and banners, or you could more elaborately decorate your home. Your decorations could also impact your activities, such as setting up a photo booth for guests to take pictures with props and a decorative background. Don’t forget to set-up your table for guests, as well. There are a variety of table setting ideas that you could try, giving you another important opportunity to show off your theme. You’ll also want to plan for any extra seating or space needs, too.
Plan Your Party Activities
Think about your schedule for the party. What will your guests spend their time doing? Is the party mainly a gathering of food and friends? Will there be games or movies after the meal? Deciding on your activities will also give you an idea of how long the party should last — and when you can get ready for the after party clean-up!
Thinking About Your Home This Holiday Season?
As you prepare for this year’s holiday parties, consider your existing window treatment. An updated window treatment dramatically changes the interior of your home. Hardwood plantation shutters are the only window treatments that increase the resale value of your home. Interior plantation shutters are elegant and timeless, providing a stunning backdrop to your gatherings and parties. You can coordinate plantation shutters with your fabric window treatment and even have plantation shutters on French or sliding glass doors.
High quality, custom made plantation shutters are our specialty at Shenandoah Shutters. For decades, we’ve crafted these window treatments in Richmond, Virginia, using real hardwood and a silken lacquer finish. Our plantation shutters are designed like fine furniture and pair perfectly with the wooden pieces in your home. We use American woods like yellow poplar and basswood for our shutters, as well as specialty woods like mahogany, oak, and cherry.
You can request a custom color or choose from stains and creams. We have traditional plantation shutter designs, as well as innovative products and installation suggestions. Our original design, the Softedge, is a patented and modern way of installing plantation shutters on tilt-in and casement windows. The Softedge design completely conceals the hinges of your shutter when closed, softening the appearance of your plantation shutters. With the Softedge, you don’t have to worry about traditional, bulky frames or hanging strips.
Shenandoah Shutters Is Close to Home
Richmond is an easy day trip from our service areas and also an exciting city to visit. Since Shenandoah Shutters is a locally operated business, you can have the unique experience of visiting our woodshop and showroom to see our process and product firsthand.
You can also call us to schedule your free, in-home design estimate and consultation. We’ll measure your windows and help you decide on the products that fit your needs. Meanwhile, you can view our gallery online, review our FAQs, and get to know plantation shutters.
Already have our hardwood plantation shutters in your home? Explore our plantation shutter decorating tips just in time for the holidays.
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