Take your Tailgate food spread game up a notch with this DIY Snack Stadium, perfect for any game day or Super Bowl party!

This Snack Stadium was super fun to make! I really enjoyed getting creative with the process, especially with branding the “yay sports” Snack Stadium! 

The inspiration behind the “yay sports” theme came from a shirt I made for last year’s Super Bowl, which I wore again this year!

I’m not super into the NFL, I’m more of a college football gal, Go Gators! However, I do LOVE the Super Bowl because it’s such a production -  hello half time show and crazy commercials. It’s the perfect excuse for me to go over the top and make something extravagant like this Snack Stadium! I’m also going to save this for college football season and bring it out at our next tailgate!

Designing the stadium wraps and other decorations was definitely my favorite part! I went with a muted green, black and white color scheme and used accented with a tan and light pink for a girly touch. I wanted to create a classic retro, athletic vibe, so I chose a retro font as well as a classic sport block letter font. I researched various “retro” athletic and other logos then opened up photoshop and did my thing! 

I brainstormed a bunch of fun puns and phrases I wanted to include and made a list with measurements of all the areas of the stadium that needed covering, then assigned phrases to areas and designed.  My husband suggested I make a score board with snacks beating out hunger and I made food labels into pennant flags to give the stadium some more height.

We kept our gathering super low key for obvious reasons and invited just 3 friends over, needless to say we had a lot of leftovers, but at least I didn’t have to plan meals for a few days!

Here’s how I made the Snack Stadium

1. Gather Supplies

• 3 Foam Core Poster Boards (20x30”) I got mine from the dollar store!

• X-Acto Knife/ Cutting blade and cutting mat

• Ruler/Tape Measure

• Tape - I used White Duck Tape for a clean look

• Printed Stadium wrap decorations

• Double sided tape or Tape Gun - I use the Scotch Advanced tape glider

• Paper straws

• Tooth picks

• Hot glue gun

2. Measure and mark your cuts

The measurements I used are below. I used two of the foam core boards for the structure and the third board is used as the base.

3. Cut your boards!

Carefully use a sharp craft knife to cut the boards, use a cutting mat or scrap card board below so you don’t cut your floor/table. It would definitely be much easier if you had a large ruler to keep your lines straighter but I just free handed and ended up with some questionably straight lines! I remedied that by adding the white Duck tape on any wonky exposed cuts to make everything look more neat.

4. Assemble the Snack Stadium

• I started with the inside 3 inch inner sideline and end zone sections and taped them together at the corners on both the inside and outside.

• Next I taped the corner sections. The shorter, 3 inch end is taped to the center. It’s important to keep these directly in line with either the side line or the end zone, depending on direction.

• Tape the outer end zones and sidelines next.

• Tape the outside corners. This was the trickiest part to make fit well - I think I should have trimmed them to fit better, as the space available depends on how the rest of the stadium was assembled, however I had already taped the edges straight. It honestly didn’t really matter much as I was able to hide most imperfections with the decorations.

• I used the 2 additional corner supports as sideline dividers - make more or less depending on your snacks! One of the sidelines was split in to 3 sections, with 2 dividers.

• Lastly I hot glued the platform braces to the inside of the two end zones then covered the end zone platforms in foil and placed them on top of the braces.

5. Add decorations!

• I used photoshop to design mine and printed them out on 11x17 card stock. I added some green card stock to fill in some gaps as I didn’t want any white to show on the outside as the sidelines were 20”. I attached the designs with double sided tape.

• I also made some pennant flags as food signs. I hot glued the flags to paper straws, then hot glued a tooth pick to the inside of the straw, so the toothpick could be inserted into the foam core board. I used the same method for the score board. I measured the stadium and marked where each flag would go to make sure they were all even.

• Finally, for the goal posts, I cut paper straws to size and used hot glue to hold them in place and glued a tooth pick to the inside of the base so it could be inserted to the base.

6. Finally it’s time to add the snacks!!

Let’s Talk Snacks!

As making the snack stadium was quite a process, I wanted to make the cooking process super simple and stuck with easy recipes and some of my usual go to’s! 

I generally try to find recipes with overlapping ingredients to make prep easier, this time I used shredded chicken in the buffalo chicken dip and quesadillas, red onions and cilantro in the BBQ quesadillas and guac, and green onions in the Buffalo Chicken dip, Chicken Bacon Ranch Quesadillas and tater tots and of course lots of cheese! 

Once I decide on the lineup, I use the notes app to combine all of my recipes in one note which makes it easier to organize my plan for making all the dishes. I try to figure out the most efficient way to prepare all the recipes by picking out which items I can batch prep and list out oven temperatures and times. Then I’ll make a plan for the day so I stay on schedule and don’t loose my mind! 

Here’s the Snack Stadium Lineup with links to recipes used

• Everything Bagel Pigs in a Blanket - Can’t go wrong with Chrissy Teigen! 

• Buffalo Chicken Dip - This is a yummy lightened up version I’ve been using for a number of years, it uses greek yogurt and low fat cream cheese.

• Chicken Bacon Ranch Quesadillas - super simple and use similar ingredients to everything else.

• BBQ Chicken Quesadillas - These were SO yummy and one of my favorite things from the snack stadium!

• Loaded Tater Tots - Bake tater tots according to instructions, remove from oven to cool, then add 6-7 tots to each skewer, top with ranch seasoning, shredded cheese, bacon, and green onions and bake for 10 more minutes.

• Sausage Rolls - super simple family recipe - sausage meat wrapped in puff pastry, egg washed and baked in the oven.

• Guacamole - I make a mean guacamole, if I do say so myself. Avocados, chopped fresh cilantro, chopped red onion, greek yogurt, fresh lime juice, cumin, cayenne pepper and salt!

• I also filled mini plastic shot glasses with sour cream and salsa to represent the players from each team.

• Celery and carrot sticks went in glasses in 2 of the corners.

• Tostitos scoops and cheddar popcorn to filled in other sections. 

The Superbowl Snack Stadium was so much fun to make and is definitely a crowd pleaser! I can’t wait to use it again for my next game day party! Let me know if you have any questions and I can’t wait to see your recreations!

Ho Ho HoLY SHIT, what a year it’s been!

In true 2020 form, while I was writing this post my Mac decided the glitch that had been occurring for the past few months had finally hit it’s breaking point and the screen is refusing to cooperate, so while this issue is being fixed by our wonderful friends at Apple (this is how karma works, right?!)

In the meantime, here are some cute pics of Kite and Dover!

Check back soon for our Real 2020 review!

We're engaged! To check one of the first things off the wedding planning checklist, and to do one of my favorite things, event planning/hosting, here is our engagement party.

We were out of the country for the new year, and I so desperately wanted to host a NYE Party, so while thinking of a theme for our engagement party, emerged our champagne, new year's eve, popping the cork party!

Having multiple Bars was apparently my motive for this event, including a bubbly bar, popcorn bar, taco bar, dessert table, photo station and of course a beer selection.

bubbly bar

The Bubbly bar included a variety of champagnes, proseccos and the like, with pineapple, mango and orange juices and fruit as well as some fun champagne napkins that were all used to mop up a spillage later in the evening!

The bar was also set with a popcorn station and selection of beers.

let's drink champagne and dance on the table

Obviously had to include a beer station with koozies and bottle openers.

The food station featured a return of the pretzel station, charcuterie and crudités boards along with individual shrimp cocktails, and a taco bar!

I of course made my infamous fruity sangria and had water bottles with custom labels available as well.

Champagne flutes with diamond emblazoned skewers were provided for guests to spear their fruit.

mike popped the question popcorn bar

Equipped with custom labeled brown bags, a variety of popcorn flavors, candy toppings and seasonings.

The welcome sign mirrored the invitation - Mike Popped the question, now it’s time to POP THE CORK. Which I traced not acrylic using paint pens.

Dessert station featuring champagne infused cupcakes, diamond donuts and fruit. I made custom cupcake topppers saying “She said yes,” “he put a ring on it” and diamond die cuts.

The favor sign included photos from our engagement and tic-tacs dressed up as “engage-mints.”

Custom water bottle labels with the party logo were also used along with the engage-mint favors.

Some of my sweet friends who came out to celebrate with us, featuring our doggo, Kite!

The theme was House warm, beer cold, conceptualized from our love of craft beer and wanting to host a beer tasting party along with the the apt timing of us settling into our new home.  

I used galvanized metal, mixed with gold frames and kraft paper in the design elements which I think came together nicely.  

I'm a fan of puns and decided that there was no need to to use them sparingly.  I mostly used them in the invitation design and framed them throughout the event.

Beer Tasting Station

Here is our beer tasting station where we kept all of the beer cool in galvanized buckets loaded with ice and had baby red solo cups available for guests to sample beers. We even purchased a personalized “Mike & Chelsea” galvanized bucket for some of the beers.

We also had tasting cards available for guests to fill out so they could rate their beers from “I’d rather drink my own pee” to “liquid gold"

I designed our libation celebration Invitation and filled it with every beer pun I could find, Ale Yeah! I then used those puns in signage throughout the event.

Pretzel Station

home made beer infused pretzels with beer cheese dip and dipping mustards. I made the hanging contraption out of PVC pipes and spray painted it with galvanized looking spray paint. I then used S-Hooks to hang the pretzels.

Friends with beer are welcome here!

a very true sentiment for our house, probably something that I need to make in to a door mat!

all of this beer must be making you hungry

Hors'd oeuvres station featuring candied bacon, charcuterie board, beer infused cupcakes, cake pops, prosciutto wrapped pears, apple coleslaw, mango salsa, guac and of course a delicious chocolate cake with a personalized cake topper! I decided to be a hero and make everything myself from scratch, fun, stressful and so not necessary, lol.

I even outfit the fireplace with a House Warm, Beer Cold banner, bunting and tassels, because I didn’t want it to feel left out of the festivities.

Backdrop with our party logo, which I printed as a blown up engineer print at Office Depot and backed it on poster board and cut out with a craft knife, then layered streamers on a clothing rack and hung the logo with fishing wire.

I made my infamous sangria in case there were any non beer drinkers among us or if anyone wanted a change of pace.

the setup of our outdoor area

later I put some popcorn our in 6-pack containers.

Take a glass, claim it as your own , use it today, then take it home

Our favors were customized beer glasses for guests to use that day.

Beer tasting cards were available where guests could take notes on their beers, rate it on a 1-5 scale of “I’d rather drink my own pee” to “Liquid gold” and declare if it was a beer to remember or one to forget.

No beer tasting party would be complete without beer bottle centerpieces! I saved up beer bottles which took an embarrassingly small amount of time to collect, I then tied them together with twine and added some fake flowers in the top.

that's some big head - mad hops

Some of my besties were in attendance!

the only photo we took together that night which is also an incredibly awful photo of us. Silver lining - the frame prop was actually photographed.