Reunion themes- 2

Can’t get to a ranch?
If you’re not able to go to a ranch or your reunion would probably not fit, try a Wild West Party Theme. The ideas we found at www.partyplansplus.com are meant to inspire and guide your planning.

Invitation ideas
Make 8 1/2” x 11” “You're Wanted” posters featuring family faces on Kraft paper inviting members to celebrate your reunion and mail in a manila envelope.

Atmosphere

• Encourage ranch hands to come dressed in ranch wear.
• Cover tables in old quilts, gingham prints or cow-patterned fabric.
• Use bandannas as place mats and napkins.
• Toy sheriff’s badge pinned to a ponytail holder makes a mighty fine napkin ring. Or write names on the badge and use as name tags.
• Display cowboy hats, toy six-shooters or rifles, a spittoon, Indian headdresses, cowboy boots, toy rifles, horseshoes and ropes.
• Soak labels off beer bottles to use as candle holders. Create your own brewery label bearing the family name.

Activities

• Get everyone up for line dances or arrange for a square dance caller.
• Put hay in the back of an open pickup truck and take everyone for a hayride.
• Host a western tune sing-along around a campfire, fireplace or barbecue.
• Set up a rousing game of horseshoes. For an indoor version, have guests try to toss pretzels on a wooden dowel.

Refreshments

• Line cowboy hats with a gingham napkin or bandanna to serve corn, taco, or potato chips. Hats also work well for peanuts in shells, popcorn, trail mix, pretzels and/or other dry snacks.
• A large galvanized wash tub serves as a drink cooler.
• If you’re cooking wieners over a grill or in a fireplace, spear them on dead tree branches and have everyone roast their own.
• Serve sarsaparilla, root beer, lemonade and regular beers in plastic or glass mugs or mason jars bearing each guest's name

Party Prizes/Favors

• A toy sheriff's star, with a self-adhesive magnetic strip attached to the back, makes a decorative and useful hoe-down memento.
• Say "thank you for coming" with a small live or artificial cactus plant in a clay pot.
• Send your party posse into the sunset with a mason jar filled with trail mix, trimmed with a licorice string.

v

Themes tie reunion programs together
   Many reunions choose themes to indicate how parties will be decorated while others design activities and programs around their themes. Georgia Burnette reports the Burnett(e) Family Reunion chooses a theme, then selects activities to reinforce the theme. Activities are always “family focused” and relate to the theme. The Burnett(e) reunion bylaws mandate a theme and program development. The 1997 theme was “Finding Renewal in Family.” The activity was educational seminars discussing hereditary health and financial planning issues. The 1999 theme was “Back to Our Roots” featuring family oral history collection. The 2001 theme was “Gathering While We May,” focusing on the family archivist’s “Burnette Trunk.” The trunk is the repository of historical or genealogical artifacts, photos, writings, and poetry of family members.
   Burnette By-laws: “Purpose is to conduct activities facilitating family members interest and participation. This may include recreational, economic, historical, genealogical, health or educational activities designed to enhance the family members well being.”

ALLAFFAs celebrate patriotism
   The ALAFFFA (acronym of the first letter of the last name in each branch) Family Reunion has had a theme every year and 2002 was no exception. In a show of patriotism, the ALAFFA’S decided America’s red, white and blue would be the theme of their July reunion. Their reunion site and family members (ages a few months and up) were smothered in red, white and blue.
   Patti Breen Homan reports that her Breen Family Reunion themes cover diverse ideas. Theme parties are their “feature event.” They’ve had a Las Vegas theme, mystery murder night, a Halloween party and 50s prom. She says themes are “always fun and, of course, always build a few more memories.”
   Phyllis Rowland, Wichita, Kansas, reported that the Rowland/Geist/Wilson Family Reunion celebrated a “40-Something” theme, dressed in 1940s clothes. Some male members wore vintage Army khakis and bell-bottom sailor suits, even a 40s wedding dress was found to wear. The musical family enjoyed singing 40s songs and had a men’s quartet expand on the theme. Those old enough to do so told stories of how they remembered the 40s, when life was “simpler.”

A wedding/anniversary theme
   The Knapp/Napp Family Reunion commemorated their immigrant ancestors’ 180th wedding anniversary at a reunion. Descendants of Conrad and Maria Napp, who left Germany in 1846, with nine children and a son-in-law, gathered for three days.
   The wedding/anniversary theme was carried out in many ways. Signs included a 180th anniversary sign for Conrad and Maria and a congratulations sign for a family member unable attend because she was getting married that day.
  Wedding bells were put on nametags for Diane and Jim Foster, whose wedding anniversary was on reunion day. An anniversary cake created by Ma’s Bakery, Bloomington, Wisconsin, acknowledged the 180th commemoration.
 Reported by Mary Thiele Fobian

James Marek, Altamonte Springs, Florida, reported that his Holloway Family Reunion in New Berlin, Wisconsin, included a gala “Night at the Oscars” for their awards ceremony. A disc jockey played hits from 1955 to 2000.

Things to consider for an Oscar party theme
   Your Academy Awards theme will take an Oscar if you use planning advice from Phyllis Cambria and Patty Sachs, celebrations experts, owners of PartyPlansPlus.com and authors of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Throwing a Great Party (Alpha Books, $16.95).

   Here are a few of their suggestions to assure that when the “Best Party Producer” envelope is opened you will win a “Lifetime Achievement Award.”

• Make an “admission ticket” invitation with clip art and print on cardstock. Enlist teenagers, dress them as movie ushers to greet guests, tear tickets and direct them to your “theater.”
• Get kids, teens and other members to act as “paparazzi” or “autograph seekers” to rush your guests when they walk the “red carpet.”
• Suspend a shimmer curtain or drawstring drapes from a rod between two PVC stands placed near the entryway to your party. As your guests arrive, have an MC announce them to the other guests and “fans.”
• Make 8.5 x 11” color copies of photos taken at previous costume parties. Frame and affix the "glossies" to posters promoting film titles spoofing the "starring" photo subjects.
• Decorate tables themed to award-winning movies. For instance, decorate a table in western style, serve chili, and/or barbecue dishes and name it “High Noon.” Use clapboards to label tables and food items.
• Play movie trivia.
• Present each of your gussied-up guests with souvenirs like framed Polaroid photos designed as a clapboard or decorated with stars and glitter …

v

Surfing the net for more theme ideas
   Surfing family-reunion.com (where they don’t use full names), we found these theme ideas.
Jan F. wrote “One of our best themes was the 60s. Everyone wore tie-died shirts and some wore long wigs. Tie a kerchief around your head and look ‘cool.’ Someone made flower power blooms out of a foam-spongy material and everyone wore one. We played great 60s music on our boom boxes all day.”
  Linda in Virginia planned her first family reunion expecting many members from England. They chose a “Christmas in July” theme with traditional Christmas dinner and decorated house. The Christmas tree was decorated with wood cutout ornaments. Each green and red ornament had a family member’s name on it and silver stars were for members who have passed away. Ornaments were taken as reunion souvenirs and brought back for each following reunion.
  And from Dollar Stretcher web site www.stretcher.com (where they don’t use names).
“Our reunions usually have a theme in which all the families participate. We have had an Olympics with each family forming a team, Christmas in July, 50s and Knights of the Round Table. These themes encourage everyone to participate and games focus on the theme.” KCW

Looking for more party ideas?
While reunions are not among the parties they mention, authors Phyllis Cambria and Patty Sachs offer countless ideas that can easily be translated into reunion parties. Their Complete Idiot’s Guide to Throwing a Great Party starts with fundamentals and goes through details in a substantial 296 pages. In their chapter about themes, they make suggestions that take little additional imagination to weave into a reunion theme. As the range of theme ideas in this article demonstrates, there are theme ideas everywhere. Those and ways to ferret out good themes for your reunion and lots of other party ideas in this iteration of yet another Idiot’s Guide (2000, 296 pages, paperback, $16.95; Alphabooks, Macmillan, 201 W 103th St, Indianapolis IN). Visit www.partyplansplus.com.

Think seasonally
 Having an autumn reunion? If it’s outdoors and you need something to engage all ages, how about an autumn scavenger hunt? Choose items available only now. Look for red and yellow maple leaves, oak leaves, pine cones, forked sticks, acorns, pebbles, thorns, moss and dried flowers.
  Consider bobbing for apples and pumpkin carving, an autumn activity everyone loves getting their hands into.

Ethnic
An ethnic theme is fun and an important source of education and pride. Ask your group historian for suggestions and information. Include costumes, music, dancing, food and re-enactments. If your group originated from many ethnicities, celebrate the diversity, celebrate all of them.

American history relived
Revolutionary era; Old West, cowboys — have a party around the campfire, read cowboy poetry, square dance, sing. Stage re-enactments or have someone teach Western dancing.

Eras
Gay (18!)90s; Roaring 20s — dress like flappers, teach the Charleston; Big Band 40s — stage a canteen dance; Rockabilly 50s; 60s Hippies and Flower Children, 70s Disco.

Celebrate events
Kentucky Derby, Oscars/Emmys — fashion your awards ceremony like the really lavish affairs; World Series, Olympics — make your tournament a group Olympics; Super Bowl, Space Odyssey — ask everyone who remembers to tell about when they saw the first person walk on the moon.

Crazy costumes
Outrageous ties, crazy sweaters, silly socks, denim and diamonds, vintage from the different eras.

Miscellaneous
Hawaiian luau — encourage costumes, hand out paper leis, build palm trees, spread a little sand, sing Hawaiian songs;
French bistro, Mardi Gras, regatta, pirates, tropical paradise, Cajun, Caribbean, beach, casino night, and any other theme you can think of from movies or TV (Sesame Street, Star Trek, This is Your Life).

Carrie Cordero asked everyone at the Hernandez Family Reunion in El Paso, Texas, to wear luau attire and everyone participated. She bought leis from Oriental Trading (which were cheap). Everyone had a good time and danced the night away.

Surprises
Christmas in July; beach in December

Reunion Resources

Hotels & Lodging

Products & Services

Free Trial Issue

Send us your name and address to receive a sample copy of Reunions magazine.

Reunions Forums
Share your planning advice and experiences with other reunion planners, attendees, newbies, and the editors of ReunionsMagazine in our Reunions forums!