One of my sweet friends turned this big 3-0 recently and we enjoyed a themed party to help her celebrate. As soon as I received the invitation, I was pumped because I love an excuse to dress up. I was also thrilled to see what she had planned, because I am hoping to have a big 30th birthday party too!

I loved this party for a few reasons.

1. We dressed up. Seriously, what’s not to love about putting on period attire and partying with friends?? At first I was thoroughly disappointed because I’d passed on THE perfect dress for $15 (!!) on the sale rack just weeks before receiving the invite. Nonetheless, Matthew and I pulled some outfits together and had a blast. I even wore lipstick! That never happens.
2. The hosts had a LEGIT bar in their home. I have never seen anything quite like it. We thought we were entering a random living space. Nope. It’s was a full-fledged bar with everything that you might expect at a legitimate pub. Matthew and I were in awe and 100% impressed.
3. It was perfectly themed. There was 20’s music, a 20’s drink menu, a password to enter, mugshots, and everything you might expect from a typical party in a hidden bar during the Prohibition era. I love a good theme, and this one was done perfectly! (Great job, Meghan and friends!)

I’d be amiss if I didn’t tell the full story of how this evening played out. This Saturday was one of those days where there were 15+ things that Matthew and I had been invited to and would have loved to do. Our final plans included a wedding for a sweet friend/former employee at 6:00 and then this birthday party at 8:00. We decided that we could make both events by leaving the wedding reception a tad early and arriving to the birthday party a bit late. I spent alllll day on Saturday searching for an outfit that I could wear to both events….something that was fitting for the party, yet not too “costume” for the wedding. We finally made a decision, and Matthew and I would add accessories in the car between events (hats, pearls, vest, etc) to make our outfits a bit more costume-worthy. In an interesting turn of events, we ended up going to the wrong wedding.

Yes, you read that correctly. Matthew and I arrived and parked at what ended up being the wrong wedding. You see, the bride and her best friend are both getting married this year and I had confused the venues in my head. Rather than being where we should have been, we were at the location for the friend’s wedding that will take place in November! Can we all just be thankful that I noticed the names on the sign and Matthew and I didn’t actually walk inside?!

This seems like it might have been a simple mistake with an easy fix. Wouldn’t we just drive across town to the correct location?? It wasn’t that easy. The actual location of this wedding was about an hour away. Even though we had arrived a few minutes early, there still wasn’t time to make it to the actual event. I felt terrible!

Now, Matthew and I had two hours to spare before heading to the birthday party. What do you do when you’re slightly dressed in costume, starving, and have time to waste? Dinner, of course! We sat at River & Rail for a bit and talked about how completely silly I was to confuse the events. We also started making some loose plans for my 30th birthday party (!!) which was very exciting.

Our evening didn’t go quite as planned, and we had a 50% success rate of showing up where we were supposed to be. That’s not too bad, right?? If anything, we ended up with some great stories to tell about an awesome bar in a new friend’s home AND of showing up at the wrong wedding. Part of me wishes we would have just attended that other ceremony and pretended to be so-and-so’s cousin. We could start our own version of Wedding Crashers! We might could have pulled it off if we weren’t in half-costumes.Nonetheless, it was a fun-filled evening that we’ll likely remember (and talk about) for years to come. I think the moral of this story is that if you invite me to your wedding, remind me to double check the invitation!

Have you ever showed up to the wrong event? You should tell your story in the comments so that I feel better about myself! 😉

Interested in more costumes? Check out these posts!
1990’s Party!  /  Pirates!  /  Audrey Hepburn!

Photos provided by Meghan Olinger and Pamela Petrus.