A few Fridays ago, Jody and I hosted our first gathering at our home in the form of a housewarming party! Hosting and entertaining guests are something that has always been important to us, but we have had few chances to do so. Now that we have settled in and added more to our little home than just furniture, we were excited to welcome our family and friends into our newly decorated home! With only a few free weekends before the holiday season begins, we were grateful to find a weekend that worked for so many of our guests.

Luckily, our apartment was already decorated for fall, so we just expanded off of that for our theme. Our party was the weekend following Halloween, so I tried to find a cohesive scheme that wasn’t solely Halloween but also wasn’t a spin-off of Thanksgiving. After one glance at my new black buffalo check pillows, I thought a Cozy Housewarming was the most perfect theme for a fall party. Ironically, after two weeks of cool temperatures, it was a balmy 83 degrees the night of our party!!

We arraigned the food around our dining room table, to allow our guests to mingle throughout the room. We also had the back door to our screened in porch opened to invite our guests to enjoy the cozy views of our backyard. I made a playlist on Spotify that could be heard in any room inside. I love a good party playlist!

I chose food that coordinated with our cozy theme including Caprese sticks, bacon bowties, a pumpkin-shaped cheese ball, spinach dip, maple cider meatballs, mac and cheese bites, ham and swiss sliders, pumpkin snickerdoodles, and individual apple pies. Yum!! Our bar cart even arrived in time to display our drink selection, including the Cranberry Apple Moscow Mules I made for the party! I had to opt for something cold once I realized it was going to be an unseasonably warm fall day. 🙂

We had such a great time hosting our family and friends in our home. It was great to visit with people from near and far and entertain those we love in our first home together. The party came together seamlessly and we are looking forward to all of the gatherings we will throw in the future.