The Ugly-Geeky Sweater Party

I have been wanting to do an Ugly Sweater Party for years, but by the time I got around to it, it was so cliche that I just decided not to try.  One of our friends reminded me about it last month and said I should do it anyway.  Always up for a challenge, I wanted to spin it so it was still fun.  My husband and I mulled it over and went with a Geek theme that seemed perfect for us and our friends.

One of my favorite parts of the Ugly sweater party concept is that it is wonderfully tacky in an almost cute way.  Geeking that up was so fun.  We’ve been asked to do it again next year, and have already decided it was rather awesome and we’d like to improve on it and give it another go.

In our invite, we specified that guests were to come in a Geeky holiday sweater, either hand made or bought and were to bring a Geeky themed treat and a game to share.  Here are some highlights:

Tee Fury seemed to be popular this year.

My husband and I sported Die Hard and Doctor Who Christmas “sweaters”

Some of our guests were so much more creative.  We’ll have to step up our game next year.

These impressed me so much, particularly as they were last minute.

Their sweaters were ordered from the UK and didn’t get here in time, so they created these sweaters last minute with mostly with felt.  In addition to another geektastic Tee Fury Who shirt, An epic Doctor Who sweater and a Words of Radiance sweater that had this Whovian/Brandon Sanderson fan very impressed.  I mean, look at those Shattered Plains! So much detail!

Again, I’m amazed.  She free handed these awesome yet adorable Firefly sweaters.

A Wash sweater and a Jayne-gerbread sweater.

For our decorations, I used these fantastic tins found at desperate.com, some printable cube people from Deviant Art, and other touches I hand crafted or dug out of our Christmas decor in the name of Ugly Sweater. I wood burned some tacky, geeky gifts and added some store bought ones.

I found my mom’s old retro tree and used it and I loved the effect and the nostalgia.

Some of our geeky grub:

Star Trek Insignia cookies (made with a star cookie cutter with the “arms” cut off of the star.)

Andy’s Mint Brownies. Regular brownies with melted Andes mints on top.

SNL’s Schweddy Balls.  AKA Swedish meat balls.

Flying Cauldron Butterscotch Beer!

And I had to add holiday scarves.

Combined with some of the games I’ll post next, this was such a fun evening with some of our favorite people and we will definitely do it again.

Some Geeky Woodburning

In preparation for our Ugly Geeky Sweater Party, I’ve begun making our

tacky door prizes.  Here’s the first one!

Our costumes 2014 His and Hers

This year was a special one as we got to attend the Mystical Masquerade in Lindon, Utah.  The rules are black tie attire or costume, so we wanted costume that was close to black tie.  We searched high and low for inspiration and finally found what we wanted.

Rick and Carrie as Dick Tracy and Breathless Mahoney

Courtesy of Castle Park’s Mystical Masquerade Photo Booth

Dick Tracy it was.

The main problem with Dick Tracy is it has fallen out of popularity and is hard to find anything, let alone quality costumes for him.  We found and special ordered the hat and found a trench coat online.  He had the rest in his closet.  As for me, We went for Breathless Mahoney and I didn’t think I could go for Madonna’s version.  I was feeling the comic one pretty strongly though. With a Veronica Lake vibe.  I actually had most of everything I needed.  I just picked up the wig, cigarette holder, and gloves.

Make up was probably the trickiest and I used a tutorial you can find here:

It turned out really well!

We had so much fun at the party!  Here’s some more fun costume ideas:

DIY Project: The Cinder Block Raised Garden

This is the first in my quest to take back the over-grown, once amazing back yard we bought.  It has been three years of weed eating, hedge trimming and deciding that I need a green thumb to make it beautiful.  This picture here is taken from my daughter’s birthday party a while back and you can see that even with weeds, it is really pretty.  I want it better.

My thumb is not green in the slightest.  It is more like a sickly black.  Gifting a plant to me is like giving it a death sentence.  I like plants.  I like the lush green and the way they light up a room or accent a garden.  But for some reason, they all die in my care.

To be fair, I’ve never had a garden.  Most of my poor plants have been inside.  Yet, there is evidence of this house once having had a beautifully landscaped yard to go with a gorgeous view.

 Soooo, with out further ado, here’s my Pinterest found answer to a garden.  I still have to keep them alive, but building this was easy and cheap, and if it works, I’ll do more.

i had just ripped up the one plant I actually want dead and out of my yard: the Juniper Shrub.  It left a lovely space for my project.

Next, I layed out the blocks in the shape I wanted and lined it with newspaper.

*Next one of these I make I will lay down the paper first.  I thought I was avoiding ugly paper sticking out, but we’ve had 2 weeds poke up on corners.

 

Then you fill with soil appropriate to your plants:

Then plant away!

Two weeks later:

THEY AREN’T DEAD!   There may just be a bit of green in my thumb.

*knock on wood*

We have so much more work to do and this is just one half of the back yard!

Here we go!

What do you get the girls trying to get everything?  A BLOG.  Naturally.  Welcome!