As long as you have somewhere to store a large party box with easy access, I think that's a wonderful idea. I think it's best to keep that sort of thing in a kitchen drawer or cabinet, since most of that stuff is used in the kitchen. On the other hand, I keep birthday stuff like streamers and balloons with my gift wrap, which is stored in a "hidden" cabinet built into the outer facing blind corner of my kitchen peninsula

Julie, after reading your post I realized I have party supplies in 3 areas. I like your idea and will combine them all this week.

"What a great idea!" said Karen, who just had to sort past party hats last night to get to a tealight candle.

OF COURSE after I got all geeked up, the hardware store didn't have an appropriate sized box, so the Party Supply Consolidation Box is postponed until I can get to Home Depot or Target; maybe tomorrow after work? It's going to haunt me now until I get it done.

Cupofkindness, you have me laughing--Your kitchen is obviously bigger than mine!

Julie

Most of our party stuff, which consists mostly of leftover plasticware and paper plates, is kept in a rubbermaid in the garage.

In addition to being party supplies, I consider the bin part of our emergency earthquake supplies.

I have a shelf WAY WAY up in my triangular closet that's nearly worthless, because it's so far up--hard to reach, bcs there's very little space.

So, I've been sticking the paper plates & cups up there, and I have a box w/ plastic silverware.

it's nearly all gone, and I think I'm going to try never to get any more, LOL!

I don't throw THAT many parties, so I'm going to try to avoid accumulating stuff. But I will need to store streamers, I guess (though I'd rather not store those, either)

Socks, I agree! Party supplies are great for when we lose power (semi-frequently).

We tend to have BIG parties when we have them, with leftover supplies. They come in handy for church potlucks, impromptu picnics, traveling, etc.

I hate to cook so whenever we have to bring "something" to a function, I tend to volunteer paper products. It's nice to have them handy... somewhere in the house?

On my way home from work I stopped at ANOTHER store looking for "the" rubbermaid tote pictured in my mind. Nope, nothing.

Julie, Don't for get that Big Lots (asuming you have one) has great storage containers of all sizes for a good price.

Using Talley Sue as inspiration (thanks, by the way!) I decided to tackle the small tote of fabric in the basement that I've been avoiding. I figured I'm on my way to bed and I could make fast work of it.

Well... the tote was EMPTY! Apparently I de-cluttered it and never reassigned the tote to a new purpose.

It's not the exact size I wanted, and it's not clear, but it is now a PARTY BOX!!!!!

Too late to dust if off tonight, but first thing tomorrow morning I'm packing up party supplies.

We don't really have parties where we need paper plates, etc. We don't have kids, so no parties like that. We have a fairly small house, so up until now, we've just had small groups of people over & used our regular china.

I like this idea a lot. When DH takes over as manager at work, we'll probably do small things for the office personnel from time to time. Not exactly a party - the current manager does a fish fry occasionally, which is very popular. If we EVER finish remodeling this house, I would like to do a small Christmas party for a few friends & would be using paper party supplies for that.

I've never made things like that part of our hurricane supplies, but I should. Since we usually have plenty of notice, I just buy them a few days before. But what if I forgot? So far, we haven't been without power more than a few days, so we could use our regular dishes for a while. But it would be better to have paper & plastic. Also, we like to have things like that available for times when we're really going to work on the house. Last year, both of us took a week of vacation to put up some siding. We wanted to use our time wisely & not spend time cooking or cleaning the kitchen. We had lots of oven meals - pizza, fish sticks, etc., & used paper plates. I'm going to implement a "party box" for us.

Greta

Greta,

The "Party" Box also comes in handy when you take food to, for example, sick friends. Pack up the paper and plastic they would need for the meal so they don't have to worry about doing dishes.

BTW, I tried using that old tote for a Party Box, but it's way too small. Bummer.

Julie:

I keep my paper plates and cups in the "paper goods drawer" in my kitchen, which contains stardard paper plates, cups, plastic spoons, knives, forks, and napkins plus tableclothes, and an empty 1/2 gallon milk jug that is stuffed with used plastic grocery bags. When I buy themed paper goods for a party, I use them up in the days afterwards because in my house, there's never enough leftover for another party. In my new kitchen, I decided that everything would have a place or would not be acquired. So gone are the days when I would store 500 cups or 1,000 paper plates from Sam's. It's just not practical from a storage standpoint. Thus, my 18" wide, 10" deep drawer really is my party box.

Cupofkindness,

Yep, your kitchen is bigger than mine! We have 4 kitchen drawers, and the biggest is 9" wide, LOL.

The good thing is we buy plain colors rather than themed products, so we can use them anytime.

I told DH about my Party Box and he actually LIKED the idea! We go searching at least once a month or so to find paper produts for one reason or another, and it'a a pain to have to go to 4 different rooms.

I have a different kind of 'party box' since I have small children. Big plastic tote with a lid. In it I store all of the really large rolls of curling ribbon, latex balloons, streamers, colored plasticware and leftover goodie bag items in it. Anything non-perishable and birthday party related.

Each year before a kid's party, I figure out a theme and what I need, and my first place to go is the party box.

It's much cheaper to do it this way than to buy new each time. Extras don't ultimately go to waste.

I keep the extra adult stuff in the kitchen but I probably should find a new home with it. We don't throw adult parties, but a 'kitchen box' for emergency supplies is a good idea.

Btw, if I run out of ribbon while Christmas wrapping, I know that I always have curling ribbon in that box...

I have a party shelf on an old bookcase I recycled as storage in our garage (aka laundry/storage area). I do keep all the decorative and even plain paper goods, cups, plastic utensils in that one area.

I also have for years kept a 'surprise box'. It's a big Double Bubble bucket with a lid my husband dragged home from somewhere, probably about a gallon container to give you an idea of size. When my kids were little I used to dump in all the garba...treasures they got at various places: happy meal toys, and the big score were goodie bag trinkets from parties. I would toss everything in before the kids really noticed and then I had this surprise box that was really very useful. For birthday parties I hosted, the surprise box was a great prize source (whoever won whatever game we played could take a turn). I used it to cheer my kids up or give them a treat after something like the dentist, or a bad day at school, or as a reward for doing something special.

The surprise box cost me zero, it recycled a bunch of those little bitty 'things' that drive parents of littles crazy and it really did tickle those littles. I've revived my old surprise box, which sat dormant for quite awhile, for my now-5-year-old niece. She gets to go to the surprise box just because we adore her, every time she visits--yes I admit I'm practicing to be a grandma :). Since we don't go to kid parties anymore my main source of goodies to supplement what was in there are the items I get free at our university job fairs--my niece is the proud owner of a bunch of logo-ed stress balls, eeny flashlight keychains and other corporate flotsam. She thinks it's all cool though!

Anyway, for those still in this stage of family life a surprise box might be a fun thing-and it might get rid of some of the detritus children seem to attract like moths to a flame.

Ann

I didn't have a party box, but did keep all of the papergoods for holidays in the boxes with those decorations.

One thing I found really handy to have extras of, and would work in a party box, is old serving spoons. When taking food to a pot luck, it didn't matter if the spoon actually got lost (mine always seems to.) I went several years using the same spoons, because of course, if they aren't your nice ones they always seem to come home with you.

Gloria

Gloria,

Great idea on the serving spoons! We take our own paper plates and plasticware to the church potlucks and always have to deal with the spoon issue, too.

Julie

The Party Box is purchased! I'm going to spend the next 15 minutes running around gathering up the supplies from various rooms. Let's hope it all fits... I stood at Target debating on sizes for 10 minutes today, and bought the smaller one.

The Party Box is too small, but it will work. I think I have everything in it except what's in the kitchen cabinet, so that's 3 rooms emptied of supplies. (definitely a GOOD thing).

Perhaps I should have gathered up all the supplies on the dining room table, and THEN bought the box? LOL

Inspired by this thread, I actually cleared out my party cabinet this weekend. We have a funny angled cabinet by the back door at the end of a run of proper cabinets (does that make sense?). I keep all the paper plates, plastic flatware, decorative napkins, bags of balloons and vases in there and it was way overdue for a sorting out. I discovered I had a ton of Thanksgiving napkins and snack/dessert sized paper plates, so since I'm hosting this year, I won't need to buy any of that. Good to know!

I know I have a bag of odds and ends of Goodie Bag items someplace (basement? pantry?), and once I find it, it will go into the cabinet too.

I haven't implemented mine yet.

I do have a couple of other boxes that are similar. I have one that I keep gifts in that I pick up during the year. I have another for Samaritan's Purse. We usually do some of those shoeboxes for Samaritan's Purse for Christmas. If I buy a multi-pack of something & don't use it all, I put it in the box so it can be used for the following year. I also put in toys from restaurant kids' meals (sometimes when I'm not very hungry I just get a kid's meal).

Greta