Our church Women's Ministry Committee (that I'm on) put on an event for the rest of the women at our church, holding it on April 15, 2004, entitled "After Taxes Celebration". We didn't ask for potluck foods, request people to have signed-up in advance or asked for dmission fees from anyone attending. However, our whole theme was around "feeling broke". We had a BLAST!!! Everyone was encouraged to dress "looking their poorest" with a Grand Prize Gift Certificate to the one voted most poor-looking being a $25 gift certificate to my Annual Spring Garage Sale, to be held May 8th. Decorations included using Wall Street Journal pages taped together as tableclothes on all the tables (so they could read what stocks & bonds they SHOULD have selected to have had a more favorable financial year), except the Guest Speaker's table which was adorned with colored comic newsprint pages. Each table's centerpiece was created using a metal coffee can spray-painted and had a length of twine tied around it in a bow and was full of dead twig branches and a (few) really-dead fresh-cut flowers. The Guest Speaker's table had a gallon glass pickle jar as the "vase" and had only the dead, fresh-cut flowers. Each person's place also contained 2 post-it notes and a tiny wooden pencil. One post-it for taking notes if they desired and the second to "vote" for who they thought deserved the grand prize.
Our dinner (that the Committee bought, prepared and served (soup-kitchen-style), consisted of pinto beans (with very few slices of sausage in them), served over white rice, (intentionally very thin) cornbread, and for dessert, 3 different flavors of Jello, (2 included a type of fruit and the 3rd had none because we were too broke to buy any more); each was served with only a teaspoon of Cool Whip. The beans & rice were served out of the oldest-looking potwear we could find. We ate off of (very cheap) paper plates, each person getting 3-4 plates to make them sturdier, and used canning jars to drink our iced tea or water out of.
The 12 Guest Speakers were either the leaders or Chairmen (or in 2 cases), represented the leaders of any group within our church that women could be a participants or member of. Our goal was that any woman there might find another avenue she (could) become involved with if interested and know a face to look for to ask about joining it in the future.
Enjoy the photos and hopefully some of you will see yourselves in some of them. :))