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Fall means football… and I love fall!

To successfully host a family-friendly home-gating party you need to focus on three main aspects: tasty treats, a kids activity corner & of course team spirit! 

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 -Family-Friendly Home-Gating Ideas-

Touchdown Treats-  My favorite part of party throwing is always in the food department! Select a theme and go all out! Since we are tailgating at home I stuck with a simple ‘we love football’ theme.  And since we have two little ones, family-friendly treats are always a must!

When preparing for a home-gating party I love to visit my neighborhood Albertsons to load up on home-gating goodies before the game because they have a fabulous selection of Coca-Cola® products and prepared bakery snacks.

A must in our home is COCA-COLA® ZERO SUGAR and Coca-Cola® and we especially love to serve our guests the options of individual mini cans and glass bottles.  Thanks to Albertsons convenient beverage section, you can load up on any of your favorite Coca-Cola® products.

The Albertsons bakery makes a fabulous football shaped cake that looks as good as it tastes and was a touchdown with our guests! It was a party game-changer!

I also like to offer a variety of grab-&-go treats for the kids to enjoy, so bite-sized cookies and red licorice in a jar are always a win in our home.  My personal favorite home-gating goodie is chips and guac, so grab your favorite bag and dip recipe and enjoy.  I also try to stick with a color scheme and have the food match the colors and all of these goodies fit in perfectly.

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Kids Activity Corner-  Let’s face it, it can be challenging to keep the kiddos attention for the whole game, so I like to provide a kids activity corner, football-themed coloring station for the littles to enjoy.  I created a Game Day FREE Printable that you can print from home and set out with crayons for the littles to color.  Trust me, they will love it!  It is an inexpensive way to keep the theme throughout and allow a distraction for the kiddos so you don’t miss the game!

Click HERE for the FREE PRINTABLE.

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Team Spirit- Have fun with your theme!  You don’t have to spend a lot to make your home-gating party award winning! I decided to go with a Cardinal red, black & white stripes and green theme to tie in our team spirit. (Red of course for our home team – Arizona Cardinals, b&w stripes to tie in the referee jerseys and green for the football field!)

Utilize decorative chalk boards, food platters and colorful bowls to tie in your touches.  Different heights and sized platters can also create dimension in your spread.

An inexpensive touch that I always switch up is disposable napkins and plates, you can have fun with these items and not break the bank.  I also love letter boards, because the sky is the limit when it comes to football themed sayings!  When it comes to serving candy wrap ribbon around a mason jar and tie in your theme (literally!).

I also used a black and white table runner, but feel free to get creative with table cloths.  You can wrap your table in football wrapping paper, lay out butcher paper and label all of your treats or look for a disposable table cloth that matches your theme.

The best part about decorating for an event is that you can grab items from throughout your home and make them tie in.  You might surprise yourself with the items you can dress up or down for your party.  I utilized existing greenery and plants from my kitchen decor to add extra green to the background and tie in the football grass touch.  Or you can grab a football out of your playroom and make it the highlight of your centerpiece.  Whatever you do, just have fun… that is what home-gating is all about!

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Enjoy Football Season & Happy Home-Gating!!!