Let's Dish! Potluck Party Ideas

As the host of your friendly potluck party, be sure to send out a formal invitation, like Pear Tree Greeting's "Let's Dish!" to guests. For one thing, this will give them a clear picture about what to expect (they'll have to contribute!) and it'll also help you plan out a look for the dinner that's fun, functional and cohesive.

Inspired by the flags on our Pear Tree potluck invitation, we created some little flags for our party foods. Yum! Simple potluck party decorations can add a lot of fun to this ecclectic dinner and still tie everything together.

Small, narrow vases in our theme colors held a flag indicating where guests could place their potluck dish on the serving table. We created the flags with cardstock and then lettered them with white stickers. Each flag was adhered to a wooden skewer and then just popped into the vase.

Fun, but functional is the idea behind these nifty DIY utensil bags. Inexpensive and bold, they add a pop of color to the party, make it easy for guests to grab everything they need at once and all on a budget!

Cupcakes for dessert! We decided to provide the dessert for our potluck and what could be better than a yummy cupcake? We were able to pull our theme and colors together on the dessert table with vanilla, orange and lime cupcakes. Inexpensive paper lanterns provided the perfect pop of color to coordinate with our cupcakes.

Party favors are by no means required for a friendly-potluck party, but it's a nice gesture that doesn't have to cost very much and will really make your guests feel special.