Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree...

'Tis the season to throw a festive party for your friends and family, yet most people are too busy to deck their halls!

I love throwing parties, but around this time of the year I find I have no time to do my Christmas shopping let alone plan a perfect party. My fiancé and I throw a Christmas party every year, but this year it just seemed like an impossible feat.

When we were considering whether on not to go ahead with it, we thought about all the reasons that were holding us back:

- no time to plan the details
- the amount of cleaning we’d have to do to get our place in order
- the shear amount of work involved in decorating our place
- all the effort to serve some delectable treats for our guests
- the huge cost
- the fact that 30 of our best friends don’t fit easily into our condo suite
- AND all the noise complaints and hassle we got last year from our security desk after throwing an off the hook soiree

It just didn’t seem worth it. That was until we realized just how easy it could be – we just called GABBY’S on Bloor.

Not only does Gabby’s have a fantastic PRIVATE room that fits up to 100 people, but it’s set up with all the comforts of home. With table seating, a foosball table, multiple televisions, and quite an array of couches – it’s like you never left your house. And the best part – there’s NO CHARGE to book it! You do have to put a $50 deposit on the room, but it’s completely refundable as long as your party spends at least $400 – which isn’t hard with a room packed full of overworked party animals ready to let loose and drink the bar dry.

Armed with a bag of streamers and other dollar-store purchased holiday décor, we were able to put up a few festive streamers and ornaments in a matter of minutes before our guests started arriving.

We had decided that we wanted a karaoke party and were able to bring in our own system which saved us a HUGE cost – otherwise we would have had to rent a Karaoke DJ for the night. We had a blast belting out the tunes -it didn’t seem to matter that some of our voices could have killed a reindeer.

The finger food platters we ordered came piled high, were extremely affordable – and were DELICIOUS! We had platters of assorted pub-style treats and platters of mixed veggies that were so fresh, you would never think you were eating them straight from the garden.

We had our own waitress for the evening and the SERVICE was exceptional. Even the manager on duty was so helpful and friendly. They let us close down the bar LITERALLY before finally calling it a night (around 3-3:30am as I recall).

Looking back, that was the EASIEST and most STRESS-FREE party we’ve ever planned:

- No cleaning up BEFORE or AFTER the party
- Didn’t have to worry about buying, preparing, serving any food
- Didn’t have to decorate our entire pad in a hurry
- No time lost planning and running around picking up party supplies
- Didn’t have to pour our own drinks 
- Spent LESS $$$ than throwing the party at home
- We were able to ENJOY the party with our guests!

What more could we ask for??!??

Gabby’s is definitely in Santa’s Good Books this year!!

Comments

By: MILLY December 12, 2007

I had no idea they had a party room - thanks for the tip.

By: AJGREEN December 12, 2007

Thanks for the heads up and some entertaining pics! So did you end up spending more than $400? By the looks of it everyone must have...LOL

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