8 Utterly Essential Tips For Entertaining At Home
8 Utterly Essential Tips For Entertaining At Home
We spend an awful lot of time making sure that our homes look utterly beautiful; and rightly so. The home is where the heart is, and if you play your style cards right, it’s also where the entertainment happens. Throwing a party in the house shouldn’t ever be a chore, it should be a way to show off your style and tastes and feel proud of the home that you’ve put together. There are tons of ways to use your home for entertainment, with some choosing to go down the traditional dinner party route and others choosing to utilize the garden that they have for those lazy summer evenings.
Entertaining guests is an exciting thing to get involved in and having a house that is worth showing off when you entertain is an absolute must. Your home should be clean, up-to-date, and comfortable, and your guests should be heading home with smiles on their faces from the brilliant evening that they’ve just had. A well-mannered guest will always be polite and thank you for your time and entertainment, and yet most hosts are left wondering what their guests truly thought of the evening that they laid on for them. When you need a little help to get your evening themed and squared away, just read the tips that we have for you below. Here, you’ll find ten completely essential things that you need to do to entertain effectively at home.
Pick The Where. Your invitations will tell your guests to come to your house, but you need to choose how you plan to host this little get-together. Are you going to lay on a three-course meal with delicate china, or are you going to have a huge outdoor mixer on your newly laid patio? Whichever you decide, you need to pick where you plan to have your party, as everything from the décor to the food will be dictated by your choice. You want to ensure that your guests will have the best time, and the best way to do that is to know your audience when it comes to invitations. Once you have the right place to host your party, you’ll know the appropriate guest list to invite.
Hide The Clutter. When you host a party, people will know your family and whether you have children. The thing is, they don’t need to see the toys, the stickers, and the drawings strewn everywhere. The calmer and tidier your house is, the more pride you will feel about it. Having guests over is the perfect time to declutter the home.
It’s All Dress Up. A big part of the ambiance of a party is the clean-up; the freshly shampooed carpets, the mown lawn, and the tidy patio is all part of the fun. Once that’s over with, you get to decorate. When it’s an outdoor party, you may choose to use solar fairy lights and decorate with low-lit candles, especially in the evening. When it’s indoors, you could switch off the main lights and accessorize the home with large votive candles and lots of fresh flowers. They don’t have to be too fussy; the simplest, brightest flowers have the biggest impact. Or if you’re not into flowers, why not opt for balloon deliveries? They’re just bright and fun, but you won’t have to worry about allergies.
Sweep The Bathrooms. If you have more than one bathroom, this shouldn’t be a problem because you can have one bathroom to guide the guests towards as well as one with all your personal effects. If you only have one, you need to sweep it out before you host your night. You should make sure any medicines and nightwear are out of sight. A guest bathroom should be simply arranged, and don’t forget the hand cream by the sink!
Go Easy With The Menu. There’s nothing wrong with restaurants full of food made of foam to emulate real food, but your house isn’t one of those places. When you’re hosting a meal or a party, your menu needs to be as fuss-free as possible. This is not the time to test out those amazing vegan Malaysian recipes from the magazine that you bought. An indoor meal needs to have some structure as well as a veggie option if any of the guests prefer their food meat-free, but it also needs to be easy to pronounce. Go easy with the complexities and make it a night of delicious enjoyment.
Remember The Nibbles. No one likes to hang around hungry, so don’t let your guests. A little grazing before the dinner is served while everyone socializes won’t ruin the night. You can go for a few platters of cured meats and blinis for a little taste sensation. If you’re hosting a garden party, try out offering cold wings and chips with homemade dips.
Easy Clean-Up. No one wants to walk around with sticky or stained fingers from their food. Make sure that you have plenty of cocktail napkins out along with extra and obvious bins for people to put their rubbish into. You need to keep your home looking spotless and when you’re hosting a meal, the last thing that you would want to be doing is clearing up old napkins and wiping dirty fingerprints off your sofas. Make sure that you leave a tray out for empty glasses or plates and be discreet with it so that people don’t feel obliged to clean for you!
Be Proud. Your home and your garden are beautiful, so you should make sure that you don’t apologize for your home or for any clutter that you may have missed. People have come to enjoy an evening with you and they don’t care about that stuff.
Have some confidence in your entertaining abilities and be proud of the meals that you cook. You can host the most beautiful evening in the garden with floor cushions to relax on as the evening wears on, or you could have some music ready for dancing in the evening indoors. Whichever way you want to entertain people, make it count!