Mad Hatter's Kentucky Derby Tea Party

Two years ago, we hosted our very first ever Kentucky Derby Party. We wore dresses and big hats and picked our favorite horse (or favorite horse's name). Last year we decided to give it a little twist. 

Much like the previous party, we decorated big hats and watched the derby. However, we decided to throw a little madness into our food, decorations and outfits.

Decorations

We made a few signs for decoration. One being the classic 'this way', 'that way' signs. We didn't need them to be very large so we printed them (using PowerPoint) onto different colored card-stock.

We also printed a large banner with each letter designed as a playing card. Thanks, Pinterest. 

We made large mushrooms using an aluminium pan that we folded to make the top, newspaper/paper towels to give the top shape, two large plastic coffee cans for the bottom, duct tape and paint. 

First we folded the pan to be a bit more circular. Then we taped bunched-up newspaper and paper towels to the top of the pan to give it a better shape. 

Next we put red duct tape over the top and taped our two coffee cans together and covered them with white duct tape. We then painted white circles on the top of the red tape. 

Here is the finished product:

For our table decor, we stopped into Goodwill and picked up a host of various teacups, saucers, teapots, and clocks. We dragged a few random chairs in from around Mallory's living space. (We didn't hang the clocks in the background just for the party. This is actually an unfinished clock wall Mallory is working on.)

What would our party be without the white rabbit?

And the dormouse.

We even painted the roses red! 

Food

We wanted to have tea party-esque food. And since our party was in the afternoon, we didn't want to have too much. We opted for smaller treats.

Our attempt at petit fours. 

We had shortcake, complete with whipped cream and berries. 

Courtney made baked turkey sandwiches with Hawaiian rolls, deli turkey, and Swiss cheese. A Dijon mustard, poppy seed, and brown sugar glaze made them delicious. 

We also baked miniature chocolate chip cookies. Largely because Mallory wanted to put them in a teacup.

Our other non-sweet treats were buffalo chicken roll-ups. These are made with cream cheese, canned chicken, hot sauce, and a little ranch dressing.

For drinks we made two types of sangria: sweet tea and peach. 

Fun and Games

We decorated our hats this year with AIW characters in mind.

As an additional ode to Alice in Wonderland, we decided to give playing croquet a shot. We found a croquet mallet at Goodwill and three roundish stuffed animals. We printed the pink flamingo on cardstock and taped it to the mallet. Our wickets were made from old wire hangers. They were a bit hard to see in the sunlight (we really should have spray painted them white) but we managed. 

All in all it was a relatively simple and fun themed party to host!

Oh, and we did actually watch the Kentucky Derby. :)