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Growing up 80’s Totally Awesome Party!

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This past week­end I cel­e­brat­ed my 34th birth­day and though I don’t usu­al­ly do this, I decid­ed to throw myself a par­ty! If you know me per­son­al­ly or fol­low me on Face­book, you might already know that I’m absolute­ly obsessed with the 80’s and have always want­ed a themed par­ty to cel­e­brate this decade! I thought this would be the per­fect oppor­tu­ni­ty now that 80’s and neon style is TOTALLY back! Since it was MY birth­day, I opt­ed for self-indul­gence and focused on all the ele­ments that brought me back to when I was grow­ing up. This real­ly was the most fun I’ve ever had shop­ping for par­ty sup­plies because of all the AWESOME mem­o­ries they evoked!!!

For the invites, I decid­ed to re-cre­ate one of my favorite and essen­tial items as a kid grow­ing up in the 80’s: a Trap­per Keep­er! Uti­liz­ing graph­ics that I pur­chased from the “Awe­some 80’s” col­lec­tion on Etsy by Maree Tru­elove, I designed the binder, which I print­ed on pho­to paper to give it more con­struc­tion and sheen, and added a small adhe­sive vel­cro. The details of the par­ty were print­ed inside on lined paper that was attached to a stack of 4x6 index cards to add to the thick­ness. I had fun with all the col­ors and fonts that I down­loaded for free on the internet!

The dessert table was cen­tered by a cas­sette stereo and a red lips phone I found at local thrift stores. I cre­at­ed some stands with VHS and cas­sette tapes, along with some Mead Trap­per fold­ers, which I found in the super­mar­ket sta­tion­ary aisles… exact­ly where I did back in the day! Addi­tion­al decor includ­ed minia­ture etch-a-sketch­es, slinkies and koosh balls. I cre­at­ed food labels with a den­im dig­i­tal paper from Granny Enchant­ed’s Blog {light­ened to give it a more acid wash effect with some paint splash­es}, then added some col­or­ful designs and but­tons and placed them on mini rubix cubes. I also found some RAD “Foot­loose” and “Flash­dance” glass­es at Ross Stores that were just per­fect! One side of the table includ­ed Cab­bage Patch cake balls, Tetris rice krispies pops on sil­ly straws, 80’s toys cake pops {pogo balls, Teenage Mutant Nin­ja Tur­tles and Pop­ples) and pop­u­lar can­dy from the era. The cup­cakes includ­ed icon­ic 80’s items, such as a Ted­dy Rux­pin, rain­bow roller skates and an L.A. Gear ten­nis shoe!

The oth­er side of the table dis­played 80’s but­ton Oreo pops, slap bracelet can­dy strips, bub­ble gum and 80’s elec­tron­ic “bytes”! I was inspired by some Screech marsh­mal­low pops I had seen in the Saved by the Bell par­ty from Nicole at Mil­lion Dol­lar $mile Cel­e­bra­tions {one of my fave par­ties!}, so I dipped marsh­mal­lows in choco­late and con­fet­ti sprin­kles and styled them with dif­fer­ent fon­dant hair styles of the 80’s! Can you iden­ti­fy the do’s: the hair band, the Flock of Seag­ulls, punk mohawk, the rat­tail, the side pony tail and, of course, the mullet!
I want­ed the back­ground to resem­ble school lock­ers to dis­play some 80’s mem­o­ra­bil­ia, so I came up with an idea to draw them with chalk and have one open with the actu­al items com­ing out of it. With the help of my dad and hus­band, we cre­at­ed an 8x8 black­board by paint­ing two wood­en boards with chalk­board paint and attach­ing them togeth­er, along with a shelf and hook. The “inside” of the lock­er includ­ed my per­son­al faves that I either owned or pur­chased at thrift stores, from toys to books to elec­tron­ics. I pur­chased the super cute 80’s pho­to­booth props from paper & cake and uti­lized a cou­ple of the but­tons to dec­o­rate the back­pack with safe­ty pins.
The open door of the lock­er was dec­o­rat­ed with cut-outs of 80’s teen mag­a­zines, but­tons uti­lized as mag­nets and pho­tos of moi and my young friends!
I could­n’t have an appro­pri­ate 80’s par­ty with­out dress­ing up! I set up a “Boda­cious Beau­ty Bar” in our guest bath­room, which offered all the make-up, acces­sories and hair prod­ucts need­ed {inside a Caboo­dles box, of course!}. Choic­es of sun­glass­es, press-on nails, jel­ly bracelets and stick­er jew­el­ry not only made me gid­dy, but my daugh­ter was beside her­self with excitement!
For din­ner, we served cheese­burg­ers with the Wendy’s “Where’s the Beef?” 80’s slo­gan in lit­tle neon school bins, along with chick­en nuggets. I want­ed to re-cre­ate the McNugget Bud­dies toys from the 80’s McDon­ald Hap­py Meals, so I down­loaded the pho­to­booth props so gen­er­ous­ly offered by Oh Hap­py Day {thank you so much to Cre­ative Juice for the fab tip!} to dress up the lit­tle nuggets! Refresh­ments includ­ed Ecto-Cool­er Hi‑C and Pac-Man ener­gy drinks!
For activ­i­ties, I had a Slam Book from the Sweet Val­ley High book series to fill out our picks for the most pop­u­lar, most like Jes­si­ca Wake­field and make pre­dic­tions in the “Crys­tal Ball” sec­tion! I also found paper “Swatch” watch­es to be dec­o­rat­ed with neon puffy paint and cans of neon sil­ly string for “graf­fi­ti”! The favors includ­ed neon pens, minia­ture note and address books and erasers.
We could­n’t get all gussied up in our RAD 80’s out­fits and not have a pho­to booth! We had a TOTALLY AWESOME time with the fun props from paper & cake and took some GNARLY polaroids!

I had such an incred­i­ble time strolling down mem­o­ry lane, re-liv­ing my child­hood and cel­e­brat­ing my birth­day! I have to say that one of the best parts was how my daugh­ter, Anabelle, was so excit­ed to dress up, sing and dance to 80’s music and said to me, “I wan­na have an 80’s par­ty, too!”… I guess my work is done. 😉


Growing Up 80's Totally Awesome party ~ Lynlee's

Merci Beaucoup!



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Comments

  5. OH MY GOSH LYNLEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You just took me back to my child­hood! Total­ly love love love every 80’s detail! You are incred­i­ble! From the slam books to the cab­bage patch cake pops. So flip­pin adorable. You rule 🙂 -

  7. OOOOOOOO MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMYYYYYYYYYYYY GOOOOOOOOOOD! This is freak­ing AMAZING! It’s like you got into my head and put every­thing I love about the 80s onto a par­ty! Pop­ples? Pogo Balls? Cock­tail (which I just watched this week­end!) Lyn­lee, I can­not. I mean, I am speech­less. Let’s be best friends!!!!

    • Your com­pli­ments seri­ous­ly mean the world to me, Britt! Thank you SO, SO much for your incred­i­bly kind and gen­er­ous words, friend! One of these days we will meet in per­son and par­ty like it’s… 1989!!! ♥

  18. That was com­plete­ly amaz­ing! I can’t believe all the details, I think you cov­ered the 80’s very well! Love the cab­bage heads, 867‑5309, and swatch­es and every­thing! Great job!

  20. Seri­ous­ly. I think I still have that same Walk­man some­where around here. I’m sure I have some fold­ers in a mem­o­ries box some­where. I can’t believe you not only did the Reebok sneak­ers but the rain­bow skates, the Polaroid! The Aqua Net! Every­thing! How in the world did you remem­ber all that stuff! (Per­son­al­ly I try to block it out… LOL) You amaze me. That’s all.

    • Oh, Michele! Thank you so incred­i­bly much, sweet friend!!! I’m obsessed with the 80’s, so it was­n’t too dif­fi­cult to try to remem­ber every­thing! LOL! You’re the sweet­est! And made it look even bet­ter with this fab site! ♥

  21. Thanks a lot Lyn­lee!! Now no one can do an 80’s par­ty because you just did it ALL!! LOL! I TOTALLY love the 80’s and I TOTALLY love this par­ty! You’re a freakin’ genius, that’s all I got­ta say. Seriously.

  25. omg I stum­bled upon this link on face­book and am LOVING this!!! A stroll down mem­o­ry lane in deed! I still have my Pop­ple toy stashed away somwhere, now I want to go find it lol. Those 80’s hair pops are such a cute idea. Thanks for shar­ing all this 🙂

  28. What type of fold­er did you use to make the trap­per keep­er invites? They are absolute­ly amaz­ing! I’ve nev­er seen a par­ty done like this before! Sim­ply amazing!

    • Thank you so very much, Melis­sa! I actu­al­ly used pho­to paper to print it out and made it slight­ly larg­er to fit 4x6 index cards inside to add a bit of bulk. Hope this helps! ♥

  29. That has to be one of the most awsome dis­plays ever..What a great job cel­e­brat­ing the 80’s, I’m a child of the 70’s and that gave me a won­der­ful idea for my 55th,Thank you for the won­der­ful Ideas..=)

    • Thank you so much for your incred­i­bly sweet and kind words!!! Good luck with your upcom­ing birth­day par­ty and most of all, have so much fun strolling down mem­o­ry lane! ♥

  33. AAAMAZING!!!! I can’t get enough, those cake balls are the cutest things I’ve ever seen! Every ele­ment is so well done!!

  34. Wow, I would have loved to see all of your amaz­ing cre­ations in per­son. I can imag­ine how much fun you and your guests had dur­ing the par­ty and I bet you had just as much fun plan­ning and exe­cut­ing the par­ty. Every­thing looks per­fect­ly 80’s!

  37. These is amaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaz­ing, I love every sin­gle detail, brought back some won­der­ful mem­o­ries. My hub­by and I laughed a lot just remem­ber­ing. Thank you for the idea maybe I’ll try it these year. Greet­ing from Pana­ma, PTY 😛 — Grettel

  39. Looks like you had an amaz­ing 80’s par­ty. I shared the info with a friend that grew up in the 80’s. I was 19 in 1980 so I most­ly an “adult” dur­ing that time. I most­ly remem­ber the fun clothes we had. 🙂

  40. Your 80’s Par­ty Dec­o­ra­tions ful­ly Take My Breath Away, because I have been look­ing and search­ing in so many years (more than 10 years!) for a real­ly spe­cif­ic and so detailed par­ty dec­o­ra­tions as pos­si­ble, every­where on the Inter­net, but now I found it here! And I have to tell your i’m a Dane (from Den­mark!), but I real­ly do hope you under­stand the most of it, and that I com­mend you all the way up to the clouds. Every­thing is so awe­some and so suc­cess­ful right down to the small­est detail, and that’s what I like, so I will real­ly con­sid­er to use some your ideas for my next round birth­day! I have tried once, but it was not a suc­ces, most­ly because I were not sat­is­fied enough and maybe not pre­pared enough, and most impor­tant, not detailed enough! A real­ly great thumbs up for all your beau­ti­ful ideas!

    • Hi Tiffany ~ Thank you so much for your sweet words, but unfor­tu­nate­ly I am not cur­rent­ly tak­ing orders! 🙁 I tru­ly appre­ci­ate you think­ing of me!

    • Unfor­tu­nate­ly I do not take orders, but if you e‑mail me at lynlee@lynlees.com, I’d be more than hap­py to pro­vide you with some fon­dant ven­dor referrals! 🙂

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