We hosted another house party in February for Lunar New Year. We called it "Year of the Doggy Style," and encouraged people to dress up to their interpretation. As innocent as Snapchat dog ears to puppy play kink, but you know... our circle of friends, not from Weho went in a few directions as anticipated.
When you think of a dog themed gay party...
EXPECTATION
REALITY
Doge approves.
We we had some leather as well of course!
But that's the idea of creating a safe space. Be as freaky as you want to be and whatever that means is up to you!
When people see our elaborate photobooths from the parties, there's always two questions: where do you find this stuff and what do you do with it after? OfferUp is my favorite app to buy and sell random things. Craigslist isn't reliable and your listings expire after two weeks. However, with every prop that I buy and sell comes a pretty good story.
The Locker - Andrew and I bought it from an artist who used it to "store his guns." We didn't know if he was joking or not, but he was living in east downtown in a garage with a mattress on the floor. He was moving out. After using it for Try Outs and also our Halloween Party which was Mean Girls themed (Boo! You Whore), I sold it to a barbershop owner who was going to paint it to match his shop and then let his barbers store their personal belongings. Thought that was pretty cool. He brought his buddy to bring it down the stairs. Thank gawd because it took all 4 of us to drag it up the stairs and it was a bit of a hazard.
Locker room and Threeway Call with Cool Mom
The Lacrosse Stick ($4 at Goodwill) - It was just a prop for TryOuts and apparently worth $80-$100 new. I sold it today to a girl who just joined a team in high school. She was super excited. I told her she could have it for free and he dad told me he would ship me some coffee beans because he was a coffee roaster. They were such a cute family and super grateful. They drove 40 minutes to meet me at Silverlake Reservoir and stayed to play with it. That actually inspired this post.
New Years Decorations - Joe hosted a NYE party in New York in 2016 and didn't know what to do with the props and decorations, so he shipped it to me. I gave it Nathan so that he can decorate his party "Fyre Festival: Till the World Ends" for this year. Joe told me how happy he was that his things had a second life after I sent him a picture of the decorations up in Nathan's apartment.
The Glow in the Dark Barrel - The First "Asian Glow" Party we did in 2013 Andrew bought this barrel from a farmer and painted it highlighter yellow. It was the first of 3 blacklight parties where I would install 8 blacklights and turn everything off. This one was fun; we had highlighters and folks drew on each other. We also high neon yarn and made it look like lasers were shooting everywhere. I've since sold the blacklights to some teenagers and also the barrel which is now in a music video.
Salon Chair - In 2016, we thought we were going to get evicted because the owner wanted to "move in," so we hosted a "Sia Later" wig party. Andrew found this salon chair on Criagslist. The photos were hilarious. After that, I sold it to a young hipster who wanted to use it to decorate their house. Weird.
ShenYun Legs - We had a party called "ShenYun: A Must See." And Andrew of course, comes up with this crazy idea to make it look like we were doing the splits with PVC piping. Of course, he based it off his 6'1 body so it didn't quite line up with everyone else who was normal Asian height unless you faced your back to the camera. It was a Asian fabric dance party, not a Chinese party... let's be clear everyone. The legs show up again in the TryOut showers and the MeanGirls Halloween party. You know, when Caddy falls into the trash can in the hallway? Stretching it? I sold it to this lady who used it for some display/craft project. Wonder where what really happened to them and I'm kinda sad I sold them cuz I feel like I could have reinvented them. BUT we still have those red shoes that look super good on Charles.
David as Kimora Lee Simons
See the legs in the shower in the back?
Jurassic Park Jeep - For Andrew's birthday, we hosted a "Dat-Ass-Ic Park" party and our friend Daniel bought a barbie power wheels and painted it to look like the Jurassic Park Jeep. You can see the purple interior on the wheel. BTW, this photo made me laugh so hard when I found it. I sold it to someone during Halloween who was competing in work group costume contest and wanted to roll into the conference room with it. We've established that Andrew really really likes parties with Movie themes.
Anyway, the point of this post is that I buy super random things and it makes me sad to see these found objects just laying in the room after a good party. I think trashing them is wasteful and donating them isn't as satisfying because you don't know where it'll end up. It brings me so much joy when I find others who actually appreciate them, giving them new life! Now... what to do with that random Titanic chair... ANDREW! UGH!
When we were brainstorming the theme for our September party we didn't think we could top "Shade by the Bell" from 2016. Then something clicked... Sports themed. Try Outs... and then it just came to us "What Team Do You Play For?" What was originally going to be another high school theme with a class photo backdrop evolved into a homo erotic locker room party replaying all of the nervousness we went through in high school during P.E.
I always want to make these themes easy for my friends to participate and I'm always impressed when they come in an outfit with some thought into it. SeanCody / CorbinFisher / RandyBlue much? But less white, more Asian.
A couple of favorites:
Rebel and Teacheer
Just me after a few drinks
Creepy nerd and Don made a 321 shirt!
Team fabulous
This is how you do it, right?
The Breakfast Club
Me.. being me
The only people who know how to play sports there
Typical Charles jumping all over everyone
Roommates!
Band geek! Jimmy got nervous when he was actually blowing this around
When we came up with the theme, Andrew go extremely excited. So excited that he bought this GIANT sofa from craigslist. In the end he had to chop it up and throw it away because it wouldn't fit in the door frame, but we lucked out with a smaller chair and trunk with the negotiation.
Meanwhile, I decorate the house with large plastic nautical themed things.
Andrew kept saying "Iceberg Straight ahead!" He bought that captain hat, telescope and the heart of the ocean jewel. Man, that fact that he was into this theme made me so excited for it. We concluded that cult films like the Titanic and Jurassic Park (Dat-Ass-Ic Park) is Andrew's specialty.
And I'm all about reusing. That's my Mean Girls wig, my space helmet because the "Old lady dropped it in the ocean at the end," and my white shawl from Easter Egg Hunty. Also, I had that gold string drappy thing sitting under my bed for years from another white elephant! I has purpose and changed up the background from Shenyun!
I drove to one hour to Beverly Hills in traffic to buy this giant Titanic poster for $20 that apparently works if you shine a light behind it. Thank you OfferUp! We're at the premiere!
Not really Christmas, but I felt like we have enough candy canes and santa hats. The other idea was to lay a door on the floor and do ariel shots. But it wouldn't quite create the illusion since you can't get a second person to hang off of it like Jack. Never let go!
Party was a success! For 3 years we've had it on a Friday because it usually conflicts with Jimmy or Andrew's schedule. We kept it this way to thin the crowd too. One year we had 60 people which made for a painful white elephant game. This year was only 30. Which made it quick and easy.
And if you didn't have a costume, no worries! I have top hats.
We put up everyone's drawings of the French Girls. The 1912's style photobooth. Lots of big boobs.
Here's the original couch. Somehow we got it up the stairs, but couldn't angle it into the bedroom. Andrew had to saw it apart to get it back down. It was about a days worth of work. The other chain in the photos was also difficult to get into the room, we basically spun it in like a rubics cube. Hashtag: worthit.
321 is an old Victorian house built in 1890. It's a perfect setting for a Halloween party, but we never made the effort because we do Christmas. This year we took advantage of the 5 blacklights that we had from Asian Glow to do an Asian Glow part II, but this time... spooky!
The spider webs glowed well under the black light. I covered the kitchen ceiling with trash bags and made an intricate web.
We used neon yarn to make another spider web for the living room. We cut out neon bats for wall and found dollar store glow things to put up. I originally bought from Amazon, but the choices at the Dollar stores is amazing. Never again! Scotch tape also glows so I used that to line chairs so people could see where to sit. A lot of work!
I was quite proud of the hallway. It felt like a haunted ride to walk through.
I made it easy for people. No halloween costume? Just wear white and you'll glow!
But people still got creative. That's a homemade Chipotle steak burrito. It's medium rare!!
These unicorns were fun!
I handed out glow in the dark glasses. Jimmy's pecs are pressing against his neon suspenders Oh my!
I reused the tree branch i dragged from downtown for our Chinese New Years party and made it spooky.
The photobooth was simple, but complex. A camp fire! With real wood and fabric undulating on top of a fan. Pure brilliance. Watch out for those spooky eyes.
After I told Andrew that I had no plans Friday night he declared that we should just have a kick back. So I posted on facebook and gathered some random folks to just hang out in our attic space.
We ended up drinking beer and singing youtube karaoke until 3AM. I told Steve to bring his ukulele and we had a jam session with Jimmy's electronic keyboard. I love how talented my friends are. Hmmm I feel like listing out their musical talents.
Jimmy - Piano
Ryan - Cello
Sean - Shamisen
Steve of course has a music degree and plays ALL instruments
And the Filipinos just sing... or at least just grab the mic.
We did Somewhere over the Rainbow, Amazing Grace, some musicals, diva songs and this gem by Lady: Pussy.
We've held so many themed parties that I feel like it's time to slow it down and just stick to kick backs and hang outs like this. I need to find more games to be excited about. The glow in the dark Halloween Party and the epic Christmas party will probably our last for a while. I do miss having Summer BBQs when we had a functioning patio, but I guess we have parks for that now.
The last party party we had was back in July. It took us a while to come up with a Summer Theme: Dry Spell. Thought it was clever because of the California drought and how thirsty our friends are. The other options were Heat Stroke, Dehydrated and Parched. If we have a summer party next year, I want a citrus theme: Lemonade. The decorations are a lot easier for that. I bought this stupid cactus wall decoration for $7 what a rip!
Andrew and Jlo have been killing it with the photo back drop. Last year's radioactive set and candy crush was simply jaw dropping, but they took creativity to another level with this desert scene. I couldn't believe it. Check out our collection of props!
They actually bought black fabric and glued it onto another, but decided it looked too arts and crafts and did a second backdrop attempting using cardboard that had been spray painted back. The giraffes make me fall in love. I refused to waste the fabric so we hang it up in the hallway. The house is becoming quite the hodgepodge of theme party decorations. I was amused at myself for leaving up the Chinese New Year decorations.
Ernesto was surprised with a birthday cake! He celebrated his 30th in France which is amazing. But we thought that it would be good to show him the love at the party with his return. Cheers Ern! He admitted that it was the first time he was actually surprised for his birthday!
It was a good comfortable turn out. Nothing crazy and a lot of good energy. Just the way I like it. There were tons of photo booth pictures, but we're the stars! Let's get out of that drought!
