Senior Servants Valentine's Day Dinner

Each year, our church youth group hosts a Valentine's banquet for the Senior Servants at church. This year I was asked to do the table decorations. Decorating twenty-five tables is a little more daunting task, and I was on a budget, but I think they turned out nicely!

A group of volunteers from the college class came to set up tables and help me decorate. I did one table on my own as a model, and then the young ladies went from there and completed the others.

The church keeps a stock of these white paper tablecloths, so I didn't have to buy any. Since everything was disposable except the flowers, we just picked them off the table and rolled everything up for disposal at the end of the night!

Red and black was my color scheme. I alternated black and white with red hearts cupcake liner cups filled with candy at each placesetting.

I did my shopping a couple of weeks prior to the banquet when everything I needed was 50% off at Hobby Lobby. I wiped out their Valentine-ish paper stock (sorry Montgomery!) to use as placemats. I had about seven different prints which we alternated at each placesetting.

Clear plastic flatwear is so much "fancier" than plain white, but it can get lost on the table, so I chose black napkins and black coasters to help it stand out some. I bought black cardstock and used a 3' scalloped punch I had at home to make them.

I needed two dozen matching vases, and I have nearly three dozen of the recycled mocha frappe bottles, so that's what I used for the floral arrangements. I bought white daisy mums and some red mini carnations for the simple bouquets. I like odd numbers in decorating, so I used three daisies and two carnations. The youth helped to clean up after the dinner, and as thanks, I told the young ladies to take home a bunch of flowers for their bedroom or dorm room. They were excited to do so, but the bottles came back home with me!

The red and white shredded paper came from Hobby Lobby, too.

Another view of the placesettings. See how I mixed the red and black?

I picked up the candy at Dollar Tree...Cinnamon, strawberry and sweet tart hearts. I also bought a couple of bags of chocolate kisses from Walmart, because what's Valentine's Day without a little chocolate?!

We had about 100 seniors to attend.

A student (high school or college age) was placed at each table as "host". Plates were made up in the kitchen and then each student served their table, kept drinks refilled, and conversed with their tablemates.

This year's entertainment was a murder mystery play.

I'm sorry to say my baby girl, Jewell, was the one who did it! That's her being led off to jail!

There you have it! Larger tables are harder to fill, especially on a budget and when you have to do twenty-five of them! But I think they turned out well. I had a good bit of stuff left over, and I've put it away to use somehow next year.

I'm so glad you stopped by my neck of the woods!

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