One of our PRO members, Jamee Bryant of Setting the Mood, was in the zone with her “Slam Dunk” Indiana Basketball Party to celebrate their amazing basketball season this year (they are currently #1!). Let’s go court side and check out all the creative ideas that Jamee used in her spirited food table!

PARTY HIGHLIGHTS to look out for:

• Basketball court food table with a basketball bowl full of ice cream with mini megaphone toppers!
• “Jump Shot O’Beer” paired with tiny “Free Throw” Tacos
• Pantry organizer stadium seating: mini chairs holding basketball peanut butter cups + IU petite fours
• Cola bottles with red stripe straws and mini coach whistles!
• Mini hotdogs, mini caprisi skewers, mac-n-cheese cups, cheeseburger sliders & fries

PARTY DETAILS, as told by Jamee…

“IU’s Journey to the Tourney”

Our very own Indiana University basketball team is stellar this year.  In fact we are ranked #1 at the moment and are a shoe in for the NCAA tournament in March.  With that in mind, I was excited to create an IU inspired viewing party display full of munchies for the the big games.

The table layout is set to mimic Assembly Hall where our home games are played.  We created a basketball court topper made from a faux wood-grain vinyl and added the center court, half courts and boundaries. The backdrop was a brick wall with the IU championship pennants hanging. We also created stadium seating with a pantry organizer (a three level canned goods organizer from The Container Store). I also found the cutest mini folding chairs and lined them up on the risers.  I also added IU scrapbook stickers to the back of each chair.  The chairs were large enough to hold small sweets. One side held Indy’s own  “Best Chocolate in Town’s” delicious dark chocolate sea salt caramels.  I piped little IU chocolate logos on each caramel.  The other side held chocolate peanut butter cups with a basketball sugar disc on top.

I decided to go “mini” on all of the food and drink as well.  Some selections were mini tacos with beer sips, Mini hot dogs in mini hot dog containers, mini caprisi skewers, mini mac n cheese, cheeseburger sliders and fries and assorted mini Ben & Jerry’s Ice cream. We also had the small glass coke bottles with stripey straws and mini coach whistles around the neck of the bottles.

Here’s to hoping to gain a 2013 Championship banner for the wall that has been idling since 1987. All of these ideas could easily be translated to your own favorite team during March Madness.

And….for those of you who are long time IU fans, and remember the great Coach Bobby Knight years…here is a little treat for you. Since we had the little folding chairs….(you may know where this is going already)….I searched on line for a perfect pic of Bobby Knight and here is what happened… yep the infamous Bobby Knight chair throw! Then we went a little rogue and posed him throwing tacos, beer, more chairs, fries, chocolates….basically tearing up the joint like you know he would.