How to throw a FABULOUS Party, McNally Style, for under £200: Part One

My mother and I have always prided ourselves on our party planning skills and 2010 has seen us pull off a hat trick.  Secretly we dream of taking on this role professionally but we are both caught up with our other projects to actually seriously consider any such idea.  All three of the soiree's we have organised this year have had a trendy spin on them in some way or another and all have been hits for both ourselves and our guests so I thought I'd document in pictures our successes along with how we made them so....

Firstly we got Carrie-d away....

That's right, with SATC2 about to hit the cinemas (which by the way I still have not seen!) I couldn't think of a better theme for my 25th Birthday back in April.  A girls only event, we decked out our dining room New York style.

We went with the colour theme from the first movie, black and hot pink.  The floor was laden with balloons.  The table was laid to perfection by myself with black table cloths and hot pink and silver lip confetti (very Lulu Guinness) and hot pink table ware.  The room was adorning New York street signs also to give it that extra Carrie and co flair.  All decorations were purchased from http://www.partypacks.co.uk/ .  On first view their offerings do look somewhat tacky but they are like a really good thrift store, or TK Maxx, if you look hard enough you can find some buried treasures!

My mum's Strawberry Centre Piece

Fill a garden pot with cement and place a wooden stick in the centre. Place a whole small melon on top once dry and cover base with foil or spray paint, whilst fixing strawberries via cocktail sticks. The perfect accompaniment to a chocolate fountain!

My Magnolia Bakery-esque Cupcakes

Recipe taken from the Magnolia Bakery cookbook and decorated as per the darling SATC themed cupcakes Lola's in Selfridges were sporting back in 2008.

And finally the piece de la resistance.....

                                                

We projected the original film onto one of the walls, whilst playing some of my favourite tracks from both the soundtrack and in general as background music.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

 

Drinks were purchased from Sainsburys and there was a choice of either the classic Cosmopolitan or my personal fave the Margherita.  Both concoctions were premixed but surprisingly good and most importantly strong for a very reasonable price!  We also offered prosecco with a hibiscus flower on arrival, which went down a treat!

As you can see from the pictures above I chose to wear a simple black onesie with some sequin embellishment at the top.  I then blinged up the outfit Carrie style with my Ghetto Fabulous initial earrings (which were switched from two of the same letter to one of each....shhh don't tell Topshop!) and these outrageous wedges!