DIY Game of Thrones Pint & Wine Glasses

If you have read my earlier posts (Part 1 & Part 2), you will know that, for my thirtieth birthday, my husband and I threw a Game of Thrones-themed house party. Being presently immersed in the book series, I was excited to find ways to bring out a crafty side of things that would allow me to geek out on multiple levels.

One night, I had the brainstorm to buy Game of Thrones-branded pint glasses as party favors. A quick Google unearthed that these can cost about $10 each on the HBO site. A bit rich for my blood, I would say! Especially as we were expecting about 40 people, I wanted to have glasses available for all without breaking the bank.

I was still riding the high of my purchase of $1 stemless wine glasses from Dollar Tree (of which I had 36 remaining) so I figured, why not take some of those and some discount pint glasses and find a way to etch them? For those new to this technique, etching glasses is done by applying a stencil and painting with an etching solution, letting it set, and washing it off so the design is actually 'baked into' the glass.

The hardest part of this project was figuring out what design I wanted, and deciding how I can get them accurately presented on the glass. I am sure you can make the stencil at home if you have a crafting machine (and design skills), but that is not something I am equipped to handle. Instead, I reached out to Dana of decalsndecor on Etsy, who was extremely helpful in getting me exactly what I needed.

I knew I wanted a mixture of both Stark and Targaryen sigils, so I sent the HBO version of the sigils as a reference. Dana was able to create custom vinyl stencils for me for use on the glasses, and I ended up ordering twenty of each, forty total, for about $29.

Once receiving those, and following the directions provided by Dana, I started by running all of the glasses through the dishwasher to make sure they are free of dust.

Once clean, Ryan and I assembly-lined applying the stencil to the glass. This is done by peeling off a protective layer on the back and carefully spreading from the middle outward. The goal here is to ensure that the border around the design is stuck very closely to the glass so that the etching solution does not slip into an air bubble and etch outside of the design boundaries. After applying, we used a credit card to ensure that it was on tightly.

Laundry room chic.

After peeling the top protective layer, I painted on the etching solution. The most popular I found was Armour Etch, which will run you about $10 for 3 ounces at JoAnn Fabric (or $5 if you download the app, as they are always posting 50% off coupons). I found 3 ounces to be the perfect amount for this project.

After painting on, I let the glasses sit for about 5 minutes each (give or take). I did a test glass and found that the 2-3 minutes I first tried left the design far too faint. 5 minutes worked perfectly. The big warning I kept reading at this stage was to be careful about the surface you use this on, as the etching solution will damage many surfaces. We have a pretty junky utility sink, so it was fine for me. That said, note the hearty, obligatory warning.

After sitting for the 5 minutes, we peeled the decal off and rinsed thoroughly. Note: despite the lack of them in this photo, definitely wear gloves for this stage. It will make it harder to peel the decals, but good heavens, why risk getting something that eats glass on your fingers.

I also recommend having your visiting guests help. Having an artist in residence definitely speeds the process up!

After they are all rinsed (and you are basking in your etched glass glory), your design will be permanently on the glass. That means you can run them through the dishwasher before use and treat them like any other glass - there is zero risk of it 'fading.'

...wow that glass really filled up since the beginning of the blog post.

Et voila! I totalled an average cost of $2 a glass for this project, a big savings compared to the $10 HBO versions.

...and, after all this, I naturally forgot to tell people to take them as favors at the end of the party. Whoopsie daisy. I am now the proud owner of several dozen Game of Thrones glasses! Thank goodness for the return of the show and inevitable parties.

This so wraps the Game of Thrones party posts! I hope that this was helpful in your own party planning, and feel free to reach out about any questions you may have.

Valar Morghulis!

A Game of Thrones Party, Part 2- The Food & Drink

Hello again, friends and fellow Game of Thrones fans. This post is a follow up to my previous post about our Game of Thrones party, featuring the theme details, decor and temporary tattoo craft from my 30th nameday - er - birthday.

While the decor was fun and gave me a chance to fulfill the craftiness I was craving, you surely know by now that menu planning is my absolute favorite part of any gathering. Planning this menu was a challenge, as this group could vary from 25-45 people, taking 'maybe' RSVP numbers into account. It ultimately ended up being about 40 people throughout the day, so thank goodness I planned ahead!

This table also had to be thematically appropriate (I was picturing a hedonistic Lannister spread), and presented in a way that kept with the general house sigil / loose medieval feel of the party. If some of the dishes could tie into book themes, all the better!

As with the first post, the amazing photographer (and friend) Alexander Wysocki was kind enough to take photos for me to use in this post. So let's take a food tour through our Westerosi-inspired spread!

For the main munchables, we are lucky to be close to the much-beloved Porto's bakery, which offers catering at dizzyingly reasonable rate. We got several dozen meat pies as well as several dozen vegetarian-friendy spinach-and-cheese pies, a savory treat we think they would happily indulge in in Westeros.

Sneak Peek - A Game of Thrones Birthday Party

Sometimes you turn 30. Sometimes you want to leverage that into a reason to throw a big, nerdy party and hope people will come because it is your birthday.

Sometimes you have the best friends ever and they will all come and indulge you by enjoying a party themed entirely after Game of Thrones. Oh my goodness, was this party fun to plan. I tried my hand at mild crafting, there were pretty obscure references in the form of centerpieces and butter shaped to look like House Stark's direwolf sigil.

These details, and more, coming to you in a special blog post several months in the making.

In interim, please enjoy this photo of a wine bloodbath.

Hosting tip of the day: if you are going to stab a bladder of wine with a chef's knife to pour into a beverage dispenser, make damn sure you have it fully over the dispenser before you do so.

Oops.

At least bloodbaths are thematically appropriate.

Guest Post: Bruce's Bear Birthday Party

Howdy, folks!  It’s Abbey, Dana’s friend and neighbor.  We recently threw a party for my son’s first birthday, and Dana asked me to guest write about it.  

A little background - Dana and I have lived as neighbors since 2011, when she and her then pre-hubs showed my husband and me their amazing new apartment and informed us when another duplex on the property opened up.  The property layout is hard to explain, but suffice it to say that we share a backyard.  

Was this the best decision of my life?  I’d have to make a Google Doc spreadsheet to analyze officially, but I present the following evidence.

1)  All of that wonderful food you see Dana posting?… well, we get to eat that.  Pretty regularly.

2)  Their hospitality extends to the beverage world.  Dana’s cocktail prowess alone should sway this argument, and then factor in Ryan’s fantastic homebrews to the equation.

3)  We get to see this guy all the time:  

To my kid, all dogs are called "Doo!"

4)  We get all of the benefits of actually living in proximity: borrowing stuff (cup of sugar, lemons, electric drill), sharing oversized quantities of foodstuffs procured from Costco or our produce subscription box, retrieving mail on vacations, just stopping in to say hello.  We should have a sitcom.

5)  Multiply this x10 during my pregnancy and immediate post-pregnancy days.  I can’t tell you how hungry I was and how many times they fed me.  

I think I can skip the spreadsheet.  

Anyway - my son’s first birthday party.  No pressure, right?  Honestly, I’m on the side of the fence of smaller-is-better for kid’s parties, partially because mine were pretty small as a kid, but also because I’d like to leave some room to grow over the years.  And also bear in mind (ha!), our families are in many different states, so I’m not trying to accommodate different sets of grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins.  

BUT that doesn’t mean it can’t be cute and have a theme.  Homemade or smartly purchased is my game, since I also don’t want to spend a ton.  I thought of asking Alex, my husband, for theme ideas, since I was raised with just sisters and didn’t have a ton of boy themes in mind.  Then I remembered he wanted “dinosaurs in space” as the theme for my baby shower, and thought the better of it.

I picked bears.  Why?  Well probably because we call Bruce “little bear.”  I don’t know why or when it started, but it seemed to fit.  It also helped that we love the woods and happened to have a few Adirondack/bear themed knickknacks hanging around the house.  Even tissue paper.  So that was good.  The rest I was able to cobble together from the craft store- just paper and fabric.

Apparently you're breaking the law nowadays if you don't have a homemade banner for your child's birthday.

And the cake - I must confess, I have strong opinions when it comes to children’s party themes (or any cake, for that matter.)   My mom spoiled my sisters and me with really great cakes when I was a kid.  Carefully constructed carousels, elephants, a Sphinx for my sister’s 9th birthday… It was many years before I figured out that was not the norm.  

Anyway, I knew that for Bruce’s first birthday, it had to center around a great cake.  I didn’t want a cutesy itsy-bitsy baby kind of bear cake, but more like the Adirondack-style bears I’d seen.  If I had been making this a few years ago for a friend, I probably would have sketched the whole thing out and constructed this myself.  But being on the other side of parenthood, I searched the internet for a pan.  Yes, a uni-tasker (sigh).  

But then I found this.  The Build-A-Bear cake pan from Williams Sonoma.  Even better, it already had instructions for the cake batter (though I used Smitten Kitchen’s Vanilla Buttermilk Cake recipe) all the way through the buttercream and decor.  Score!  Homemade but something I didn’t have to carefully plot out first.  

Mr. Bear was a pretty good success.  I stayed away from the fondant clothes, because in general, I’m not a fondant fan.  I did need to cover up Mr. Bear’s middle seam, hence his tie (yay fabric remnants and a glue gun!)  That Vanilla Buttermilk Cake recipe filled Mr. Bear’s pan and a single 9” layer (later split) perfectly, so all I did was triple the buttercream to fill and frost.  Added some last minute touches like these meringue mushrooms I had already made for party food and a decorative flag (since, oops, I forgot to leave space to write in the frosting).  Mr. Bear was also tiered and the extra skewers helped hold him in place.





I tried to make the rest of the food bear-ish, but people needed to eat too.  (I have a special ability to survive only on Teddy Grahams and honey sticks.)  So we whipped up burgers and my mom’s recipe for pasta salad (toddler friendly and I daresay, a hit.)  

Meringue mushrooms were something I made all the time as a kid.  Again, my childhood was not normal.

Pretzel sticks, honey sticks... we're in the woods!  Get it?!?!

Of course, I can’t have a party without employing Dana.  She and Ryan headed over early, guessing that I might need a little help (who, me?)  Ryan was nice enough to man the grill for burgers and Dana took care of smoked salmon hor d'oeuvres, drinks, and even photography.  

What Dana makes when Abbey throws ingredients her way and says "make it pretty!"

Our little bear seemed to enjoy it.  



But of course, Mr. Bear couldn’t end there.  No, our sense of humor is too weird to waste this occasion.  What occasion, you say?  The Game of Thrones finale aired the next day, and we decided to continue our tradition of watching it together.  So Mr. Bear had to undergo a slight transformation to get an invite…



Don’t worry - I did this out of sight of Bruce.  But transforming his birthday cake leftovers into a festive and rethemed Father’s Day cake did feel pretty scandalous.  (Who said being a parent didn’t have it’s perks!)  Perhaps even one day (18th birthday?) Bruce will get to see what really happened to Mr. Bear.