The Brown Family: SURPRISE!!!

Several weeks before my mother's birthday, my brother Kevin, and my sister Karen, and I all gathered together at my house to plan out the festivities. The first decision was that we wanted the whole party to be a surprise - not small feat considering we were trying to keep a secret from my mother (who happens to be one of the snoopiest women alive) ;)

We reserved a church, decided on décor and food, and did our very best to contact everyone she knew. We went with a pot luck style dinner and asked that in lieu of gifts (my mom hates accepting gifts....no offense mom but you are impossible to try and spoil!), everyone bring their favorite dish to share instead; family friends, and fabulous food are what my mom really loves! My biggest concern for the whole party was that no one would come... and while I knew she would ultimately be thrilled that her sisters came to spend the weekend with her, I wanted there to be lots of people to come and celebrate with her. The turnout was great... and so was the spread of food! We had shrimp cocktail, meatballs, chili, chicken pot pie, cheesy potato casserole, cheesy bread, rolls, rice, salads, fruits, veggies, cookies, brownies, and the list goes on. All of my mom's sisters drove down from Washington and Oregon and so many other family members and friends were able to help make her day special. Thank you all so much for coming! It was so fun to see my mom get all the attention for once and we think she was really surprised, she swears she had no idea!

My sister and I decided to go with a fall/autumn theme since we could use a lot of décor from our houses at the party and not have to spend quite as much to decorate the less than appealing cultural hall. I started right away in deciding on what to make for centerpieces. I decided I wanted something with candlelight - there's just something cozy and inviting about lots of candlelight. I ended up using a few dollar store frames, some photos printed on vellum, battery operated LED lights, and some fall acorns and leaves.

I also decided to make a Happy Birthday banner to hang up behind the food tables. I opted for burlap since it went perfectly with the other type of décor we were using.

The week of the party was filled with lots of errands and running all over town. The morning of the party the boys and I arrived at the church to set up at 8:30 and my sister joined us a little after 9am.

Here's the before of what the cultural hall looked like:

After a very long and tiring five hours, here's the final result:

The most time consuming part of the party for me, though, was gathering up all the photos. I had to sneak into my mother's house while she was out of town, gather up all of her photo albums, bring them back to my house and scan them, then sneak them back into her house. I even made a trip over to one of her cousin's just to gather a few more pictures. After I had them all scanned in, I went and photoshopped them a bit and then had them all printed out. It was fun to have all the photos displayed at the party, and I had several people tell me how much they enjoyed getting to see all the photos of my mom - especially the ones of her as a small child.

Close-up of the finished centerpieces - and of course we had to incorporate some of my mother's favorite candies: M&M's.

Guests patiently waiting for my mother to arrive. Kevin left at about 6:45 to pick her up. We had told her that we were taking her out to dinner at the new Yard House Grill in the Village, and that we had reservations for 7pm. The church is only a mile or so from where she lives so Kevin was able to zip over there really fast and pick her up.

When they arrived we had everyone simmer down and then shout "Happy Birthday" when she walked in. She swears she was surprised and that she had no idea we had anything planned.

The best part of the whole party, for me, was seeing my mom realize her sisters were there. Their big group hug was the sweetest thing ever!

Singing 'Happy Birthday' and blowing out the candles.

Mom and her sisters checking out some of the old photos. We tried to get a cute group picture but those ladies wouldn't hold still long enough to get one that wasn't blurry...sorry!