Housewarming Party

I absolutely love playing hostess. So when hubby and I decided a couple months ago that we wanted to have a housewarming party, I got super excited. 

Well, we had our party this past weekend, and I think it was a success. Everyone seemed to have fun, the food turned out great, and I had a blast planning it!

First of all, planning a party gave us motivation to get some things done around the house. We finished up the kitchen by hanging some fun artwork. We painted the dining room and bought some dining room furniture (finally!). We painted the office/craft room although we still need more furniture/decor for that room. We set up all of our new living room furniture and found some cute accessories for the room. We did a little yard work. We organized the heck out of the giant piles of boxes we still hadn't unpacked. by the time the party rolled around, the house was looking pretty good. I was impressed with how much we got done so quickly!

When it came to menu planning, I got reallyyyyy excited! I remember a year ago or so seeing an idea for a chili bar on Pinterest. I decided to go with it for our party. Especially because Pete and I LOVE chili. We go to Hard Times Cafe like every other week for chili nachos. Yum. 

So I made three different chilis since I had a handy dandy triple slow cooker we got as a bridal shower gift last spring. I made a Terlingua Texas no-bean chili styled after our favorite Hard Times chili, a traditional turkey chili which I used my aunt's recipe for, and a jalapeno chicken chili. I also set out a tray of chili toppings including cheese, diced tomatoes, jalapenos, onions, and sour cream along with some tortilla chips for those of us who prefer chips to spoons ;)

I made a crockpot mac and cheese which turned out delicious.

I made my secret crab dip recipe. Maybe I'll share one day... 

I made a veggie pizza which a friend gave me the recipe for. There a similar ones on Pinterest though!

We also had chips and dip and a cheese board.

For dessert I made some apple cupcakes which were very moist, super sweet, and delicious.

For beverages, we bought beer, several of our favorite local wines, and I made a spiked apple cider which went over quite well with some of our guests.

Our biggest concern was entertaining people... but it turns out you don't have to do anything special. People love to eat. And people love to talk. We played some music in the background (thanks Pandora!) and just enjoyed mingling. Later in the evening we lit a fire in the firepit and the guys enjoyed hanging out around that. Overall it was a pretty easy going carefree party and I enjoyed every minute of it!

So thankful that all of our friends were able to come out and... warm our house with us :-P 

House-warming??