Twenty something years ago my mom and I started a New Year's Eve tradition of watching a movie marathon up until midnight to ring in the new year. I think the first run of movies was a bunch of old black and white monster movies that were playing on cable TV. We would make a buffet of all the snacks and treats we would ever want to eat, and park ourselves on the couch with our feet up watching movies.
Down the line I got married, my mom remarried and we instructed our husbands how we camp out in front of the screen in comfort. There is a theme chosen each year and we select movies from our vast collection to fit the theme. Somehow I ended up adding a few decorations and got more elaborate. Extended family was interested in coming and we had to change locations to my in-laws house. They have more space, no pets and a projector.
This time for the end of 2019 we chose an Under the Sea theme of films. The average attention span for hardcore movie marathon buffs in our family is about 5 movies. We start between noon and 1:00PM and time the movies to end about midnight.
The selection we chose:
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954 Disney)
Operation Petticoat (1959)
The Little Mermaid (1989 Disney)
Treasure Island (1950 Disney)
Aquaman (2018)
We make sure there is at least one movie that the littlest kids can watch. No one is required to stay the whole time, they can come and go as they please. We let the family know the general time schedule when certain movies will start, and lunch and dinner times.
The general consensus from the family is that they really enjoyed the entire room decorated floor to ceiling this year. I'll list sources for decoration ideas from other sites from what you'll see in the pictures.
Favorite toy of the kids to play in...the giant shark head inner tube.
Baby pool filled with ball pit balls and a set of sea life bath toys mixed in (a fun set with a small net). Balls were everywhere, and the kids figured out what to do with the net. Keep it contained in a corner if you can.
The giant octopus kite was a great highlight in the corner of the room and helped disguise some of the objects in the corner.
Making the coral reef boxes was lots of fun. Collect the pool noodles in the summer when they're cheap. Walmart had the narrow ones for $0.99 and the price went up from there for the bigger ones. The best source for making most of the pool noodle coral was from this site, My Humble Home and Garden, and TeeDiddlyDee
I used cardboard boxes and brown packing paper to make the base. Invert an open box, cut off or tape the outer flaps, then tape the loose flaps from the inside of the box to the sides of the box so it will be easier to cut through the base. Make sure to reinforce the inside with extra tape. Cut a piece of paper big enough to cover the box, and crumple it up to make wrinkles and creases on purpose. Cover the box loosely to make your base. Use a sturdy knife to stab holes straight through the paper and box to wedge your coral ends in the top.
Hot glue anything and everything that looks like coral or sea life to your base. In real life coral is very colorful. If it's white, then it died. Use dyed coffee filters folded and glued in multiple places. Spiky gift bows that look like sea anemones. Fun tubes that look like sea tubes. Open weave mesh fabric hot glued to skewers to look like fan coral. Cut up egg cartons for barnacles. And, small fish toys hiding in the middle.
The hanging seaweed from the ceiling is made from plastic table cloths covers. Get the pre-cut long table size, it will be the easiest to cut. The clearest instruction on how to cut them are from this site. Borrowed Blessings. There is an up and down on how you hang them. I used several strips of masking tape to hang them from the ceiling. I didn't want to damage paint. We decorated the room the day before and had to re-tape a couple of them that fell overnight. The strings of paper bubbles were from Hobby Lobby in the party section.
I purchased lots of plastic fill-able ball ornaments from AliExpress. Most items are inexpensive and shipped from China on this site. Give yourself at least a month for your orders to arrive, it will take time to get to you. Then I cut a piece of iridescent cellophane/tissue paper to put inside the balls. String several lengths of fishing line from the balls and hang those from the ceiling. Again, more masking tape. Now you have lots of shiny bubbles. Some of these fell off during the night. If you want, use extra tape or Command Hooks.
Around Christmastime Hobby Lobby has hundreds of ornaments. I found several blown glass fish ornaments when they were 50% off. Definitely use Command Hooks if you're hanging these from the ceiling.
The least expensive decoration is the trash bag jelly fish. If you can find clear trash bags at your store, great! I ordered from AliExpress again for these. This is the site for instructions on how to make them. Little Stars Learning. My husband was lazy and didn't want to do the long squiggly tendrils, so he just did shorter straight cuts.
The star of the evening was the sea life silhouettes under the ceiling lights. The parents convinced us to leave them on the ceiling so the other grand-kids could see them after the party. You'll need the roll of blue tablecloth plastic. Hobby Lobby has the 100 foot rolls in various colors. Cut your length to cover your lights and a little extra to swag like waves. We used Command Hooks to hold it to the ceiling. Three hooks on the ends and two in the middle. To make the hook points sturdy, put some masking tape on the edge of the plastic where you want your hook and use a hole punch through the tape and plastic. The tape will reinforce the hole and the hook won't tear through it. You'll need at least two people to hang it straight.
To make the the silhouettes, I used some free .jpg images and went through Block Posters to make the pictures bigger. The use is free, and you can print them on your own home printer. I suggest laser printers, it will use a lot of toner, because it prints on several pieces of paper. You just tape them together and cut them out.
Remember, you need to use silhouettes of the top or bottom of the sea creature, though an oncoming shark could work too. Side pictures will look like the fish is sleeping.
I also found a few plush sharks and fish that were on sale during the holidays, and bought some sea life print fleece to make blankets. The kids could pick a toy or blanket to take home as a party favor. Yes, that is a mattress on the floor. Sometimes the floor was the only space to lay down and still watch the movie. We like comfort.
This was our New Year's party to the extreme. We served smoked salmon, fish shaped snacks, crab dip, shrimp cocktail and fish and chips for dinner. Serve what you like at your movie party, it's all about comfort food.
*All opinions are mine. Links to products and other sites are for your convenience. I am not compensated for their promotion.
