DIY Ideas for a Western Party You’ll be Wild About!

Looking for creative and fun ideas for a western party? This is filled with budget friendly, authentic ideas, that will make you feel like you stepped back in time!

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Our Western Party was a hit and …. this marks party #5! Which means we are over half way through our 9 parties in 9 weeks challenge! Can I hear a little WOOT WOOT!!! I must be a glutton for punishment or something because we squeezed in an extra party (another wild west) last week. Apparently we didn’t get enough of this one!

IDEAS FOR A WESTERN PARTY

I have always wanted to throw an old time western party (well, I was raised on John Wayne movies-McLintock! is my favorite). My husband also liked the idea because it would give him an excuse to craft a perfect batch of homemade root beer.

Creating the Wild West Ambiance

For this party, we wanted to create an ambiance that would take our guests and ourselves back to the days of the old wild west. We wanted to create a bar scene, so we created a fake wall separating our kitchen from our family room. We created a makeshift bar and used anything and everything we could find to create an old time feel. From the pictures we had up on the wall to the decor pieces we had around. The entire room was stripped of anything that didn’t fit the time period.

If you want to learn more about our diy western party decorations, you’ll definitely want to check out my western party decorations post! It goes into more detail of the props we made and used.

Getting Guests in the Mood

Setting the perfect scene can do a lot, but having people come dressed in character can take a party to a whole new level! So in the invitations, we made sure to encourage everyone to come dressed up in western attire.

It was so fun to see people’s creativity! One of our friends even brought his BB gun from his childhood. How cool is that?! I wonder if they would have dressed up more if they knew the extent of the decorating, because they were really surprised at how much we set up the place.

Originally, I was planning to dress up as Annie Oakley and my husband as a bartender. But fortunately, the Miss Oakley’s costume was out of stock so I decided to go as a Native American. And on account of my husband’s great Spanish accent, he went as a Mexican bandito. It was a good thing we changed plans, because it added a bit of diversity to the group. 

Food Ideas for a Western Party

We didn’t want to worry about serving an entire meal, so we scheduled the party to take place around 7pm. We kept it light, simple, somewhat to the time period, and delicious. Homemade smokies, chips and salsa, veggie sticks, beef jerky (which doubled as fake cigars), and cowboy cookies were what we served.

And bar wouldn’t be complete without root beer! We had a lot of varieties of root beer, both store bought and homemade by my husband. We even had a few of the bottles from his homemade batch explode after the party!

And I LOVED using the pie tins as plates! I am so glad my husband encouraged me to get them when I was hemming and hawing over them at the store.

Games Ideas for a Western Party

All parties should have some type of activity. For this western party, we decided to play a card game called BANG!.

It’s set in the wild west and funnily enough was created by an Italian. The gist of the game is the Outlaws are trying to hunt the Sheriff, the Sheriff and his deputies are trying to hunts the Outlaws, and the Renegade is ready to join one side or the other to be the last one standing. Easier said than done because only the Sherif can reveal who he is during the game. So as a player you only know your own role and that of the Sherif.

It’s a super fun game although it does take a round or two to get the hang of it. But it worked perfectly with our western party theme. When we pulled a card that allowed us to “shoot” or “drink a beer”, we picked up our toy guns or poured ourselves a shot of root beer. It really brought the game to life!

Photo Backdrop Ideas for a Western Party

I was a little surprised at first that all of our guests wanted to take pictures right off the bat. But then I realized that the bar scene setup that we had created was a perfect western party backdrop for photos! So we fired away with the camera and had a lot of fun doing so, as you can tell!

In Conclusion

Why haven’t we ever thrown a Western Party? To be honest, the thought was a bit overwhelming. If you think we did a lot of work here, you should have seen all of the ideas in my head that I decided I wanted needed to do if ever we threw a western party. Wagon wheels were a must, a saddle or two, hay barrels, hitching posts, a cactus…. and the list goes on. Hey if I could even borrow a horse or two, I would!

Thankfully I decided to go with it for one of my 9 parties and that made me work with what we had! We definitely want to throw another western party in the future and because of that, you know I am going to be perusing garage sales and estate sales for anything and everything that will help dress up our next western party.

Now if only I had a room to store all of our parties supplies… that would be simply wonderful!

Areas labeled according to holidays and parties…. take that back, instead of a room, several rooms or rather a very big room for all of our decor! I would start collecting furniture that I could reuse for all sorts of events… if only we had the space… and if only my husband would let me! (o:

Hope you enjoyed these DIY ideas for a western party!

And to close with a picture of the cutest little bandito around.