Here's how to make your party planning easy

The end of the year is filled with revelry. There are weddings, sangeets, anniversaries and house parties. The pleasant weather is perfect to socialise with close friends and family. But planning a get-together can be fraught with logistical hassles. So if you’re tasked with organising a party, here are a few tools and resources that will put the fun back into being the perfect host.

Instead of sending an email or printing cards, you can send party invitations using Punchbowl.

This resource allows you to choose pre-designed templates for weddings, birthdays, baby showers, children’s parties, professional events, festivals and more; each with its own sets of tasteful graphics. In fact, you will even find Indian themes that you can use.
After you choose your template, you can customise your layout, add your invitation text along with the time, date and venue details. But that’s not all. Punchbowl allows you to set up a digital RSVP so your invitees can save the date, set a reminder, and add it to their calendars. You can also see how many adults and kids have confirmed their attendance.

In the case of Potluck parties, you can request your friends to bring food, drinks, desserts, etc. And each invitee can also see what others have volunteered.
PunchBowl even allows you set up a gift registry using Amazon or any other service of your choice. If you’re hosting a fundraiser, you can request money contributions via PayPal.
With Punchbowl, you can create multiple invites for different occasions and see them all in your dashboard every time you log in. In fact, once you use this service and see how wonderfully simple it is, you will never use anything else.

“Hey, do you have any ghazals?”
“What about David Guetta’s ‘Bang, Bang’?”
“You know what would be really fun? If we had those Bappi Lahiri disco songs from the 1980s”.
If you’re fretting over getting the right kind of music for your party, don’t worry. You can turn to streaming services like Gaana and GrooveShark. Create a free account, and you can make playlists of the songs that you want.
Gaana has an extensive catalogue of international songs, as well as in practically every regional language, including Assamese, Bengali, Bhojpuri, Kannada, Konkani, Malayalam, Marathi, Tamil and Telugu. To sample new music, check out the playlists of other members, or tune in to Gaana’s myriad radio channels that sort songs based on singers and even by theme or mood. And yes, it also has apps for Android, iOS and Windows Phone.
If you plan on going international, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a better streaming service than GrooveShark. Here you will find top international chartbusters, new albums and songs by genre.
Your guests can use these services to queue up requests to the designated DJ for the evening. It should be noted that streaming songs will incur internet data charges, so it’s best to do this on your home network.
www.gaana.com
groovesharks.org
You could ask your friends to carry their own party music on their smartphones which you can then plug into your home hi-fi system via a two-way 3.5mm cable, or play them via Bluetooth speakers.
The LG OM7550D is a complete boombox with a DVD/CD drive; with the Bose SoundLink III, you can expect direct Wi-Fi connectivity to stream your music from the internet – and interestingly, you can connect two Creative speakers of the same model for larger stereo sound (but you will require Creative’s MegaStereo cable for that).

Beer, rum, vodka, whisky, wine and fruit juices are all wonderful beverages for parties, but if you want to shake and stir things up a bit, head to Drinks Mixer. Here, you will find over 22,o00 drink mixes across categories such as cocktails, shots, punches, liqueurs, non-alcoholic beverages, beer and ale, and even coffees and teas.
You can search for mixes by name (Bloody Mary, Mojito, Long Island Ice Tea, Martini, Smoothie, Shakes, etc), by (multiple) ingredients, and even specific brands of alcohol (Absolut, Bacardi, Smirnoff…). You will find detailed recipes, and even how-to videos wherever available. The home page has a ‘pick of the week’, and a listing of the most popular mixes, so don’t forget to check those out.
Drinks Mixer is also home to a bartender’s glossary and guide, measurements, and the right glassware to use. Ah yes, it also has a section dedicated to drinking games!
www.drinksmixer.com

Snacks

If you’ve got your music and drinks sorted, all you need is some delicious food for a fantastic party. We could suggest multiple websites that are packed with wonderful snack recipes. But instead, we’re going to make things easier for you. Simply visit the ‘Indian Snacks’ page on Pinterest. You will need to sign up for a free account, but once you create one, you can follow this page for snack recipes from all over India. The landing page is packed with appetising photos of dishes like samosas, croquets, masala pav, chaat, dhoklas, naan nachos, cheese puffs, kebabs, pakoras, hotdogs, meatball curry, mutton sukka, crispy chicken, paneer fry, kheema cutlets and more.
When you see a dish you like, click on its picture to access the complete recipe. You can then ‘pin’ that recipe to your own Pinterest page for ready access whenever you need it. The best part? This one Pinterest page will link you to multiple cooking websites all at once.

in.pinterest.com/explore/indian-snacks

Games

It might look like an advertising page that’s selling you board games from Amazon, but don’t be misled by its bad design. Party Game Central is home to over a 1,000 free games that you and your guests can enjoy.
On the left side of the homepage, you will find a panel that lists categories such as birthday games, bridal parties, singles, couple’s and group games, card games, dice games, kids and grown up games, ice breakers, outdoor games, New Year games and more.

Click on any title in any category, and you are presented with the games objective, minimum number of people required to play, the props you will need, rules, and ratings given by folk who have tried it out.
You can print this page using its ‘Print’ button and hand these out to your guests. If you have children attending the party, it’s best to have a few games planned for them so they don’t get bored. Ice breakers are best to get the party started, and even if you didn’t plan on playing any games, it’s always nice to have a few surprises up your sleeve (you never know which party might need that kind of rescuing). Of course, don’t forget to browse the drinking games section on Drinks Mixer.
www.partygamecentral.com