Party Planning

Sarah’s 40th Birthday Party

Date :: October 18, 2003

Location :: City of Oakland Leona Lodge

Theme :: “40 Years of Being Sarah” :: I chose one photograph of myself from each year of my life from 1963 to 2003, which I used on the invitation as well as at the event.

Food :: Since it was my party, I had the luxury of choosing all my favorite foods. The format was a buffet of finger foods, including strawberries with sour cream and brown sugar for dipping, mangos with lime and chili pepper, Chicken Cilicia (Turkish chicken with chickpeas), and baguettes and brie. Red and white wine, Margaritas, and Kahlua and Cream were abundant.

Event Activities ::

40 Years Posters :: At the lodge, I mounted the 40 images on the wall with white space around them. I had an iZone Polaroid camera that takes 1” images and prints them with a sticky back. As I greeted each person, I took their picture and then asked them to go to stick their picture on the poster of me from the year they met me and write a little something about our knowing each other. At the end of the evening, I had 40 pages with pictures of all the people that had come to the party and messages from them to put together in a memory book.

Playing “Dress Up” :: The main activity of the event was to play “Dress Up”, my favorite game since childhood. People were encouraged to come in costume, but also to bring extra costumes to share. We provided a large collection of varied costumes as well, including gowns, coats, vests, hats, masks, wigs, accessories, etc. etc. In fact, one key reason I chose Leona Lodge for the location was that it had a large foyer with extensive coat racks on either side and large bathrooms with plenty of room for changing. The highlight of playing Dress Up was to take posed portraits, like at a prom. We had professional camera and lights set up with a fun back drop, and the other way I was able to interact with my friends and family was to take their pictures on this set in their various get ups. Some people changed several times throughout the evening.

40 Years of Being Sarah Soundtrack :: I hired a DJ and provided an extensive list of all my favorite music from the whole range of my 40 years, from Sesame Street and Captain and Tennille to Benny Goodman to the Vapors and Psychodelic Furs to Sting and World Beat Music. I chose 20 of my top favorites and burned them on a CD (with a custom “40 Years of Being Sarah” label of course) and gave them as party favors.