I hosted a Friends themed Friendsgiving / Birthday Party this weekend. I am a die-hard fan. I put Friends on before bed almost every night. I’ve seen each episode numerous times and would kick your butt at Friends trivia any day. And yes, I enjoy throwing my own birthday parties because 1. I love to host events and 2. I have so many different groups of friends it’s fun to bring them together. Plus my godfather used to throw his own epic birthday parties and I like the idea of paying homage to him by doing the same.

Here are some of the details that went into this special day.

Invites & Outfit Inspo: I sent out invites and put together a quick mood board of costume ideas since I wanted people to dress up.

Food: I provided a sign up sheet of carefully selected dishes based off references from the show. Everyone brought their A game. The spread turned out even better than I could have imagined. “Joey doesn’t share food” but we sure do!

Check out the food card labels I created for a closer look at the menu:

Costumes: Everyone went above and beyond with their outfits. I was extremely touched by how the guests that aren’t Friends Fanatics (like me) put so much energy into their costumes. I dressed up like Rachel when she was trying to impress Joshua, one of her clients at Bloomingdales, and spontaneously throws a going away party for Emily, Ross’ new love interest, who’s returning to England. Rachel put on her old cheerleading costume from highschool and does a classic “American” cheer as a send off but also a cry for attention from her crush. I used to be a cheerleader and I loved this story line so it was an easy outfit to select for the party. We had so many other goodies too: Joey wearing all of Chandler’s clothes, Monica’s diner costume (with extra tatas), Ross in Vegas, Janice, Monica’s Turkey Head, Richard with the mustache, one of the Phoebes performed Smelly Cat, and a friend even wore blue eye contacts and the iconic Rachel hairstyle. I swoon.

Decor & Details: I put a loooooot of work into this FRIENDSgiving. I’ve spent many many many hours watching this show so I had so many tiny details I wanted to incorporate into this party I’d been dreaming up for years. I crafted place cards by hot gluing coffee beans into tiny coffee cups with classic name tags (as a play off of the episode where Ross throws a party in his new apartment and nobody shows up and he wears two name tags) and included as many funny nicknames and obscure characters from the show. I also handwrote Rachel’s 18 page love letter to Ross, used Central Perk coffee mugs as candle holders, arranged flowers with themed cards as accent pieces, colored a Science Boy comic, used Friends trivia coasters, drew on the iconic Magnadoodle and much more.

I ordered a few props like the Gladys art piece and the Geller Cup from the sweetest Etsy shop. She even wrote on my shipping reciept how I have the coolest last name. Fun Fact: In highschool my best freind’s last name was Green and mine’s Geller so alphabetically we were next to each other. For senior year I wrote Rachel on my hand and pointed towards the left and she wrote Monica on her hand and pointed to the right so in the yearbook it looked like we were pointing to each other. That also shows how long I’ve been a fan since I turn 33 tomorrow…

I curated a playlist with songs from the show to play during the party. Feel free to peruse on Spotify.

After our feast we played games, sat around the fire pit and talked story all evening.

Even though I had a chemo infusion the night before and I just started my monthly steroids I felt pretty good most of the day. But my parents were a HUGE help. My dad set up the bistro lights, tables and all the heavy things and mum helped cook my contributions. After everyone left they were like “you have the sweetest friends” and I couldn’t agree more. I am oh so loved.

This time last year I was stuck in the ER hoping to be released before my birthday and this year looks like this:

Thank you to everyone who participated. ILYSM. I can’t wait to host the next extravaganza.

HBD to me 🙂