1. We planned a chili cook off and the weather was strangely hot.
2. Our building was in the midst of getting new A/C's and the gym did not have air.
3. The night of the event our town was under a severe weather alert and I did not plan a rain date.
I did have a moment where I freaked out but I realized that I had no control over any of the problems and there was no choice but to move on.
My first mistake was not asking for help putting up the tables and chairs. We had planned for 200 people and that is A LOT of chairs for 2 people to do. We spent a good bit of time trying to figure out how to fit that many tables and chairs into our space. I took some photos and printed them so next time we'll know where everything goes. It took 23 round tables and 3 long tables for that many people. I chose not to use table cloths on these tables as we were going to be eating chili.
I made all of the decorations. I was happy with the newspaper and pages from a book pinwheels. They were free and I was able to make various sizes. I also made the candy corn pom-poms following these directions. Next time I would use more of each color tissue to get a fuller ball. This table was where I placed all the carved pumpkins people brought for a contest. The winner received a $10 gift card to Target.
I also made three centerpieces that came out super cheap but really cool. I used my own containers. At first I was bothered that they did not match but it didn't matter. The branches were free, the pinwheels were made with what I already had and the blackbirds and moss were purchased from the dollar store. I also found some berry sprigs in our attic that had burst from the heat. They looked great for Halloween!
I also bought some parchment paper to roll down the center of each food table. I really liked the results. It took one box for 2 long tables. I also found that Wal-mart's plastic table cloths are .50 more expensive than the dollar store's but they are more opaque and look nicer.
We chose to do 4 long tables to serve the food on. Two pushed together on each side of the gym. This gave people 4 available lines to get their dinner. It went fast!
I also had a separate table for punch. Originally I purchased Sprite and Hawaiian Punch for this but both of those ideas were bad. Red drinks are bad bad bad and anything carbonated will go flat when in dry ice. Apple juice was served instead. At least it was served for a little while. My punch assistant and I freaked out thinking the dry ice was melting into small chunks and would injure anyone drinking it. It was just the apple juice freezing and becoming slushy. Oh well. I have plenty of apple juice left for some wassail at the Christmas party. I bought the dry ice from Publix. It comes in a flat block and costs about $1.49 a pound. Five to six pounds will last several hours.
Now for the chili contest. I found this judging sheet online. It's a bit more professional than what we needed but it worked great. To be in the judging the chili's had to be there by 15 minutes after the activity started. This worked well. We only had 1 person come late. Out of kindness I just didn't tell her that her chili wasn't judged. I made a chili sign in sheet and as they came in they were assigned a number to tape onto the pot.
The actual judging could have been better organized by me. Next time I know to have the judges all sit at the same table. Each chili in it's own numbered cup and each person use their own spoon to taste. Then onto tasting the next chili using a fresh spoon. In the end we had a winner and she received a $10 gift card to Target.
I must say I was so proud of our ward for braving the weather and bringing what they were asked. We had our 200 people show up, maybe more.
It was finally time for CANDY! We had no choice due to the weather but to put parents lining the hallways and the kids going through them. They didn't care and they had a great time. The kids that is, I think the parents were just relieved to be in the cool hallways.
The clean up went surprising well. My partner suggested we do a sign-up sheet for clean up and that was a big help. Almost everyone who volunteered helped and lots who didn't sign up helped anyway.
All in all I think it went well. I learned a whole lot and I'm looking forward to my next thing......the float for the town's Christmas parade.
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