Charity Event Decor Success

The charity event that I posted about last week was a big success! There were record breaking bids for the dessert auction portion, and I've gotten so many compliments on the decor.

Even with my husband's help, the set up took about two hours longer than I was hoping, but we still got everything done an hour and a half before the event started. And since I already shared the details of all that I'd been working on, I wanted to do a follow up to show the decor in action.

Unfortunately we were a bit rushed at the end of set up (and eager to get home, shower and change, and get back for the silent auction) that I didn't take photos until we arrived back at the venue, and didn't get to capture everything. But here is a peek at all of my hard work for the past few months.

First, this is what the ballroom looks like, taken from the venue's website. It is one big beige room, and you aren't allowed to hang anything from the walls or ceiling, making it a bit of a challenge to decorate on a tight budget that doesn't allow for uplighting or expensive pipe and drape.

Source

And this is how it turned out, with our tulle and twinkle light stage backdrop, to focus everyone's attention away from the boring beige walls.

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Feels Like I've Been Planning Another Wedding

No, I'm not dead. I just haven't had any time for posting lately because I've been so busy! Combining planning and creating all of the decor for a huge charity event with the busiest time of the year at my job means I haven't had time for much else the past few weeks.

But things are finally all coming together with the charity auction decor I've been working on, and I am mostly done now. Which is good, since it's this Sunday! And now that I have a moment, I wanted to take a minute to share what I've been working on.

First, some background. It is for an annual holiday auction for the OCRCC, which is their biggest fundraiser of the year. And this year it is the 25th anniversary of the auction, so the theme is silver and sparkles, since the 25th anniversary gift is silver. We also have to work around some of the holiday decor the venue already has up, mostly some Christmas trees, but that is alright, since we want to encourage people to buy gifts at the auction. We just didn't want to go all out with the holiday theme for decor. And one issue with the venue is that we aren't allowed to attach anything to the walls or ceilings. Another factor is cost. Everything has to be done as inexpensively as possible, since it is a charity, and anything not spent on decor goes right back into the organization.

Budget and venue constraints? Basically feels like I've been planning another wedding!

In past years they haven't done much for the event, mostly just some simple table arrangements or a pointsettia for centerpieces and additional arrangements on a few of the tables in the lobby. But since it's such a special year, being the 25th anniversary, I was tasked to come up with something a little more special, while still keeping the budget to a minimum.

Which means non-floral centerpieces, when we are talking about 35 dinner tables that need to be decorated. So instead, we are going to have two types of centerpieces. Since we can't have anything on the walls in the ballroom, I'm going to bring in taller topiary arrangements for the tables to the sides and back of the room, to add interest and height. For the center and front of the room tables, we will have simple but elegant shorter centerpieces, so the view to the stage won't be blocked.

Here is a mock up of the tall rose snowball pomander topiary centerpieces, however the actual vases will be 16" x 4" and in my mock up I only had a 14" x 6" vase to use, so the final look will have the pomander ball and vase much more in proportion to each other and more topiary-ish with a taller and thinner vase.

The centerpieces will all be on 10 inch mirrors that the venue provides, and surrounded by 3 or 4 votive candles, also provided by the venue. We are doing all black linens, as a nice backdrop for the sparkly elements.