How to Host the Ultimate Favorite Things Party that Everyone Will Love

This favorite things party is one of my favorite parties I’ve ever planned. With great ideas for food, decorations, and even awesome gift ideas – a favorite things party will be a traditional your family and friends will love!

Tips to Host a Favorite Things Party

What is a Favorite Things Party?

The idea behind the party is based on Oprah’s Favorite Things shows where she talked about her favorite things and then gave the audience a copy of each one. Since I couldn’t give everyone a 7-day cruise (one of Oprah’s gifts), I thought I’d come up with a little surprise of my own well because I can’t just copy someone else’s idea exactly.

For the party, everyone brings three copies of their favorite thing (i.e., if mascara was your favorite thing, you would bring three things of mascara) up to $10 and everyone goes home with three things from other people, so you’re basically sharing your favorite things. Make sure your guests bring their gifts wrapped!

It was so much fun, kind of like a late Christmas. Even though everyone knew that they would get three gifts, it was really fun to watch how excited people were when their name was called. It’s definitely something that could easily be done once every few months since everyone could easily come up with new favorite things.

How a Favorite Things Party Works

When everyone arrives, have them do two things – put their wrapped gifts on a table and write their name on three pieces of paper and put them in a large bag or bowl. So once everyone has arrived, you will have a bowl with three copies of each guest’s name, including your own.

Pick someone to go first. They should first get their gifts from the table then pick three names out of the bowl of names. Gift their gifts to those three women and let them open them together. Once the gifts are opened, the person who brought the gift should explain what it is and why its their favorite. Continue onto the next person and repeat until all of the gifts have been handed out. People shouldn’t get two of anything and they shouldn’t get their own gift.

Favorite Things Party Food

For this party, I made all of my favorite food – pizza loaf, pigs in a blanket, cupcakes, and more! Just pick some of your favorites or make it even easier on yourself and have everyone bring their favorite dish to share.

Favorite Things Party Gift Ideas

For the party, everyone brought their favorite things. You can pick whatever your favorite thing is but here are some of the things brought to our party to get you started:

iTunes gift card
Pillow Pet
Lip balm
dry shampoo
Anthropologie soap
Water cup
Olive oil mister
Spoon rest
Scrapbook paper
Room fragrance
Wool Socks
Aveeno Lotion

And while I would have loved to get any of those things, I love the three I eventually ended up with. I definitely needed one of the purse hangers and I can’t wait to try the top coat nail polish and listen to the CD!

My gifts wrapped

Favorite Things Party Favors – Swag Bags

As part of my favorite things party, I reached out to local vendors and Etsy shop owners and asked if they would be interested in providing items for the party in order to get in front of a local audience of women who would be coming to my party. I was lucky enough to have some amazing vendors participate and we had everything from a free massage to free jewelry for all of my girlfriends.

Since every vendor participating didn’t provide one for everyone, I basically split up all of the gifts evenly between the bags and added a number to each gift. After my friends presented their favorite things, they picked a number and picked up the goodie bag with that number attached. It was so fun to see what was in everyone’s bag, definitely one of the best parties ever!