My Favorite Things Party

A little while back, I threw my first Favorite Things Party. Woot, woot!

In case you don’t know, the Favorite Things Party comes from Oprah. When she did giveaways to audiences on her show, she would give away items that she called her “favorite things.”

Now, I have heard of these parties, but I am apparently a little slow to the game, as this was the first one I’ve thrown. It was so successful I already have another one planned with a different group of ladies!

Preparation

I started by selecting several ladies whom I thought would enjoy the event. I have read that some hostesses have 15+ attendees at their Favorite Things Parties, but I personally enjoyed having under 10 ladies. It was very relaxed, yet fun, and had an intimacy to it.

I asked attendees to bring two things:

1) Their “favorite thing,” concealed and priced from $5 to $10, in a quantity that matched the number of other guests. These would be used as gifts for the others at the party.

2) A favorite food item to share.

I didn’t yet have a vision of how I was going to do it, but I knew I wanted a fun, get-to-know-each-other experience for my girls, several of whom did not know each other. So, I emailed approximately 20 questions to each of them. I asked them to return their answers and email me a baby picture of themselves, too.

This was all done about a month before the party.

As the answers came in, I created a fun “Who Said That?” sheet.

I already knew these ladies pretty well, so I knew they would all bring smiles, excitement, interesting “favorite things,” and great food.

Party Night

I love brie with orange marmalade and toasted pine nuts, so I offered that with some of my favorite crackers (Mary’s). Oh, and yummy citrus and cucumber water in glasses with “Girls’ Night” printed on them. But we also had nachos, cake pops, peach sangria, fruit salad, bao, cucumber tuna roll, brownies, and more, because the guests all brought their own favorites.

Activities

I opted not to do an icebreaker and did two other activities instead. One was “Guess Who?” I displayed the baby pictures I received with numbers instead of names, and the guests had to guess who was who. We had such a diverse group of ladies that it would have been too easy to guess, so I threw in a few pictures of celebrities that I got off the Internet. Oprah was one of them, which seemed fitting. 🙂

I passed out copies of the “Who Said That?” sheet. There were questions about their favorite ice cream, food, movie, line from a movie, and beverage. There were also questions about what they wanted to be when they grew up and a “Something I Bet You Didn’t Know About Me” question. Everyone got one of these sheets with the various answers, and the object was to guess who said what.  

Sometimes I read the correct answers, and sometimes, the guest just admitted that it was them. It was amazing to see the results, and even more amazing to see how fun it was to learn about each other and how unique we all were.

I opted not to decorate or focus on the famous song, “My Favorite Things,” from The Sound of Music, as is often done. Instead, I created a Mad Libs handout for the song. You can download it and the other activities here.

We did the Mad Libs towards the end of the evening, just before the gift reveals, taking turns reading our own Mad Libs. Some of the Mad Libs were absolutely hilarious. Halfway through, my cheeks hurt from smiling and laughing so much. This pleasant reminder continued into the next day, as I still felt the aftereffects of such a fun night filled with so much laughter.

The Gift Exchange

We had nine ladies total, including myself. Unlike the bigger parties, where ladies bring five or six of their favorite item, I had asked the ladies to bring eight – enough so that each of the other attendee would get one. This was easier for me to organize, because I didn’t have to decide how the gifts would be allocated, which is usually done by a game, drawing from a bowl, closest birthday, etc.

We did the gift-giving at the end of the night. Each lady shared what they had brought and what made it a favorite thing of theirs.  Who got the most correct answers on the “Who Said That?” sheet helped me determine the order.  I used the nearest birthday for a tie breaker.

The Favorite Things included bird feeders, lip gloss, journals, port, candles, and biscotti. My gifts were used copies of the book Being Happy (at $5 each) and my favorite tea. The “Girls’ Night” drinking glass they had been using for the night were theirs to keep as well.

I think the next time I host one of these, I might buy or make canvas bags for attendees to take their booty home.  Okay, who am I kidding? I probably won’t make the bags but will just go to the dollar store and get something. 🙂

All in all, this was a delightful evening for everyone. And I know this because everyone texted me the next day and said so.

As the hostess of the Favorite Things Party, the fun also included the planning and prep in addition to watching the ladies leave in a great mood with all their new toys. It’s important for us women to have fun and take care of each other, and it’s so rewarding to know that you’re the one who provided a positive experience for such deserving friends.

Have you hosted a Favorite Things Party or other such fun gathering? What did you do to make the evening special? And what will you use from the description above?

If you want a copy of the Mad Libs or other Favorite Things activities that I created, click the links for free download. Tip, if you use the Mad libs, fold it into thirds so ladies see and fill out only the first part until the time comes to read them. Be prepared for laughs!

Party on Ladies!