Surprise Party

[katiedoodles]

Last Saturday night I hosted a surprise party for my husband's 50th birthday. I was a tough feat keeping it a surprise, especially since he works from home 3 days a week and his office is about 20 feet from mine! We had friends and family (from three different states!)...best of all was his reaction when he walked in. :eek:

I haven't been on the message boards recently because I have been either planning, cooking or recuperating!

[StitchinGrandma]

Oh how fun. My husband will be turning 50 this year as well and I did have a similar thought. :D It would be tons of fun to do but it would mean MAJOR rearranging of our living room and cleanup which he must be involved in doing or there's just nowhere for anyone to sit. I HATE my living room because there is a couch. That's IT! OH and a chair at my piano and one at his desk and another office chair at a desk that I used to use and is just sitting there taking up precious space.

So I'm assuming he was surprised and had lots of fun?

[katiedoodles]

Oh boy was he surprised! It took him a few minutes to be able to walk into the house...he just stood there trying to figure out what he had just walked into! (Good thing I know he has a good strong heart!)

I know what you mean about your living room; I had just fnished painting the kitchen and living room about a month ago. Then three weeks ago we had to have the carpeting removed in our dining room which led me to having to paint the dining room...since I was not going to get up on scaffolding to paint the entire room, we decided to put chair rail around the entire room (and I only had to paint the lower walls). The great thing was that my husband never wondered why I just had to get everything finished up (he knows I'm insane :) ) although I nearly gave it all away when the dry cleaner needed two weeks to clean the draperies and I only had a week before the party! My solution....no draperies (I don't think anyone noticed).

If you do decide to have a surprise party for your husband, he will love it! Mine has commented on it at least once a day since last Saturday (and he mentions it to people he talks to on the phone too!)

[StitchinGrandma]

My only problem in doing something like that is that most would be coming from out of state. Given the fact his birthday is in December I'd be afraid of a lot of last minute cancellations because of the weather. You know in Northern IL the weather can change in matter of hours in the winter. :( Of course, I could always have it in October. HA THAT would really surprise him. :D

[katiedoodles]

Have it in June for his 49 1/2 birthday :)

[StitchinGrandma]

I don't have enough time to plan that soon. I have WAY too much work I'd have to do ~ or actually get HIM to do since my health doesn't allow me to get that many things done. :( I sure would LOVE to do something because he infuriates me at times about his birthday. It seems we never have money when his bday comes around but his big thing has always been "It's just another day" comment always about his birthday. Grrrrrrrrr That's why he infuriates me about his bday the most. My family always celebrated birthdays and I raised my own children the same way. I keep bugging him that we need more seating in the living room but he tries to ignore that for the most part. LOL Men have a tendency to do that when us women whine like that I think. HA

[Jami Johnson]

Sounds like a fun party! I love parties...both planning them and attending them. It makes surprise parties even funner when the person is actually surprised. Glad you were able to pull it off.

Vicki, have you thought of doing a party at a restaurant? You probably have and have a good reason why it won't work, but just thought I'd toss it out there.

[StitchinGrandma]

Vicki, have you thought of doing a party at a restaurant? You probably have and have a good reason why it won't work, but just thought I'd toss it out there.
I have and may go that route if I decide to do this. I'm not sure how people would take an invitation to a party months prior to the birthdate. I wonder if they would take it wrong or realize the travel issues we could encounter in the dead of winter ya know. I'd hate to pay for a room and catering etc and then have no one show up in the month his birthday is but I'd also not like to have people choose not to show because they are upset for me doing it in the summer months too. ugh. SO many things to think about. I KNOW how people don't honor RSVP requests any longer from our past experience with our wedding and other parties so I already know I can't count on anyone bothering to let me know they'll be here or not.

Maybe I'll just admire those that can pull off these great parties and just save money until December and take my hubby on a wonderful surprise getaway for his birthday. :D Of course, since he does wander around this message board once in awhile none of this will be much of a surprise if he sees all this chattering about his birthday. LOL

[Jami Johnson]

Maybe I'll just admire those that can pull off these great parties and just save money until December and take my hubby on a wonderful surprise getaway for his birthday. :D Of course, since he does wander around this message board once in awhile none of this will be much of a surprise if he sees all this chattering about his birthday. LOL

I do like the surprise getaway idea very much!! I vote for that. Come see me in Salt Lake, will ya? Haha.

Maybe we'll have to delete a few of the posts in this thread to help ensure the upmost surprise!! :)

[StitchinGrandma]

I'd love to come out that way Jami. In all my life I've never been further West than South Dakota although that's NW but still that's as far as I've gone that direction. East however I have gone almost to the coast into Pennyslvania a few years ago when we went to photograph a wedding together for a friend and then a lot of the southern states. I was promised our next trip will be to Maine so I can eat lobster ALL day long though. But, I also want very badly to go to Vegas since I've never gone there either. I've heard too that Celine will be back next year for another 2-3 yrs of shows. I would dearly LOVE to see her.