Husband Turning 50....what Ideas for a Party

For my dad I WAS planning a Over the Hill and Through the Woods party. Sadly I wasn't able to pull it off.

The cliche for age fifty is "Over the hill..." but it often ends, "... and on a roll!" What would make your husband feel "on a roll"? Is there something he has always wanted to do? Can you make arrangements so that he can do it?

Even if it's a trip that he (and you!) will need to take later in the year, you can announce it now.

Now that I am over 50, I am convinced it's not "over the hill" any more!

How about a casino night?

We're holding a surprise 65th for my Dad this year. The party will take place in a hotel and my mother has told him it's an employee awards banquet put on by her company. LOL I can't wait.

hot air balloon ride ? horse back riding ? romantic dinner with the two of you and then lead him to a concert with other friends going .

My friend did something cool for her husband's 40th - I don't know the exact details, but somehow she arranged it that he could drive a race car around a track. Like NASCAR I guess. He loved it! My husband will be 40 this year and I'm thinking about doing something similar, but my husband LOVES boats, so I might look into him being able to drive one of those really fast boats (cigarette boat?) I think he'd get such a kick out that. Maybe your guy is into something like that - something that you don't normally "let him" do?

My husband is ALSO turning 50 in August. I'm thinking about having a BIG party/cookout at the house. (He doesn't want anything, but ya only turn 50 once, right?) He'd probably like a pig roast but I'm not W. about that....

My husband is turning 50 in April. I also want something very special, but not sure what. Money is always an issue, but I also want to make it special for him. April C. - I love your idea - do you have suggestion for the month of April :)

For my mom's we took her to Medieval Times, she had a blast and had always wanted to go. Is there anything he has been wanting to do? Horse back riding, archery lessons...?

If you want to do a party instead of an event, then you could have a big poolside bbq, big family camp out/bonfire, on a lake rental party boat or something. Not totally original, but can still be very fun.

It dipends what his interests, hobbies, are...or else you could just choose a theme, like ice-cream party, nutella party or pizza party etc... held in a very different,unthinkable place. Could you rent a room in a museum, for example??? Or an area at the zoo?? Something like that...have fun!!

For my friend's birthday we did a 1950's themed party at a local 50's diner (don't know if you have one near by). They actually had a small party room in the back which was perfect. Jukebox music, people dressed the part, themed cake, etc. We did music trivia and had a 1950s themed quiz. I gave away $25 restaurant gift certificates I bought for $2 on restaurant.com. Everyone had a BLAST!

For my husband's 50th, I tried to make it a surprise, but he figured out we were having a party (but didn't know why, since it was 6 months early).....he hates cold and hates his birthday being right by Christmas (the 22). When we were dating thousands of years ago, he'd mentioned that he wished he'd had a summer birthday. So for his 50th I threw the party 6 months early, 6/22. I rented our neighborhood clubhouse patio (beautiful, and overlooking the pool complex (6 pools, waterfalls, gardens) from 1pm-3pm, AND rented the party section down the hill at the pools for a "pool party" from 2:30pm-4:30pm. They let us use the great room and kitchen as well, so we did an island themed party: some Jamaican friends catered it and fixed curried goat, jerk chicken, Jamaican rice and peas, and 2 awesome punches (one type had rum, the other type was nonalcoholic). We also had a lovely vegetable tray with a great ranch dip I made, hollowed out a watermelon and served a fresh fruit salad in it, and baguettes with spinach-artichoke dip I made. We also served hotdogs because there were kids there that we thought might not be "adventurous". I had our favorite Bob Marley CD and also UB40s greatest hits as music (just background, not too loud). The tables were decorated with great table cloths and everyone had a (fake) lei to wear (got them at the party store). We had a beachy birthday cake (I saw some awesome sand castle cakes, but they were out of my budget with everything else we were doing; I just got a normal cake that was decorated), and neopolitan icecream to please everyone. Our guests were a pretty cool mix: I invited coworkers that I knew he liked, some old friends, neighbors, our pastor and friends from church. We sang happy birthday, visited with each other, the food was set out banquet style, and we just enjoyed a pretty day. As a gift, I did 2 things: the first was gathering birthday messages, notes, memories, pictures, whatever was sent from people all over the world (family, friends, people he had no idea I could find) and put it all in a "birthday book" for hiim. I did this by email mostly. All of his family are in Scotland, England, Guernsey, Germany, and friends all over the UK, France, and South Africa. I tracked them down, as well as friends who live out of state here and asked them to contribute a photo and birthday message and we got a pretty good response! I printed each person's note in a different color to brighten the book up. The 2nd gift was a box that had goggles, a disposable waterproof camera, and the brochure and sign up sheet for scuba lessons! (We had been talking about wanting to take a cruise, and wouldn't it be awesome to get scuba certifications so when we went somewhere wonderful, we could go diving). That's how I presented it, but the truth was that I'd been putting money into a separate account and had the money already set aside to take the classes together. He was excited to see that the tropical theme was not just because it was by the pool, but because we were preparing for a cruise. We overlapped the pool party (the guests were allowed wristbands) on purpose so that as one party and lunch were winding down after gifts, they could head down the hill to enjoy the pools while a few of us that were already prepared to stay behind cleaned up our mess and put everything away. Between the 6 of us that stayed behind, the party was cleaned up and tables/chairs put back in 20 minutes. Then we went to the pool to swim too. It was an awesome day!
Obviously, parties don't have to be SO involved, but 50 is a big number and I just wanted to celebrate. Another suggestion would be do you know if he has something special he'd like to do on his bucket list? Perhaps you can knock one (or a few) off on his birthday!