Ugly Holiday Sweater Party

via Instagram

SO I know the holidays are past us now (even though I still have a pile of holiday decorations waiting to go into storage) so clearly I am a little behind! But I wanted to post about a holiday party we threw this year - it was super festive!
Apparently this idea of "Ugly Holiday Sweater Party" is a phenomenon that unbeknownst to me sweeps the holiday season. I am not sure how I got this far in life never hearing of this...but alas I am now in the know!
Also I didn't realize how hard it was to find a really ugly holiday sweater these days! I know I have had them in my day, gifts given to me through the years that a forced smile and thank you must be expressed to the generous giver of that holiday adorned sweater. Too bad I didn't hold on to them - what I would have given for that holiday cat sweatshirt I had when I was 15 =/
So the search for the perfect holiday sweater was daunting, I scoured thrift stores, department stores and discount chains like Target and Khols but I found the best place was a thrift store and I hit the jackpot at our local Salvation Army. There were so many good choices but I ended on this bad boy! I paired it with a festive top I found at old navy and some bright red tights! Oh and of course some reindeer ears.

We held a contest at the party for the ugliest sweater and I  have to say - there were a lot of ugly sweaters there, def. some great finds. But ultimately the winner was my brother -and he made his own holiday sweater. A trip to Michael's a little bit of crafting and this is what he came up with! (Yay! we are a DIY family)

We set up a photo booth in the bedroom, I put wrapping paper on the wall as a backdrop and guests had fun posing in their ugly sweaters. We had one Halloween sweater at the party as I did not discriminate on what holiday the sweater could be for, and of course my favorite sweater of the night you can see here with the white holiday cats - loved it!)

Some of our guests got a little carried away with the photo's and they hijacked the cat's scratching post. Jules was hiding safely in the closet during the commotion but I don't think he was too pleased about this.

A trip to Home Depot for some last minute decorations for the party ended with this coming home and landing in my tub! Guests got a pleasant surprise when they visited the bathroom (not only did he light up but his head moved!). Sadly he was returned to Home Depot the following day as I certainly have no place to be storing that beast all year long.

Photo via thezartorialist.com

I did a little DIY decorating as I came across this "Steal this idea" post on Brooklyn Limestone a few days before the party and so I did! I cut out letters from red construction paper and strung it up! It was rather time consuming so I only got one string across the room but I put some up along the wall.

Please ignore the gaping hole in the ceiling where a light fixture should be - and stay tuned for a future post regarding my never ending search for lighting!

We also played some party games at the party one being White Elephant Gift exchange. And this was super fun! All the guests were asked to bring a wrapped gift ($5-10) and we picked names out of a hat and each person choose a gift, opened it and then the next person could either pick a new gift or steal a previous gift that was opened. Surprisingly the most coveted gift of the night was a vintage 1982 issue of Penthouse (someone stole it out of their parent's collection) and yes these were late 20s to 30 somethings at this party. Other fun gifts were an old boom box (with a tape deck!) we aren't sure if it actually worked and I think it was picked up from the trash on the way to the party - but it offered a good laugh when it was opened. I walked away with a bottle of wine so I felt like a winner! We then played a few rounds of Cards Against Humanity which is an awesome "adult" party game, it's a saucier version of Apples to Apples. All in all it was a fun night filled with holiday cheer!

OK well time to take the holiday decorations down to storage, until next year!