Decorating ideas for a High School "Spring Sport" Banquet?

Balloon bouquets are always festive, have a big presence (i.e., they take up a lot of room visually), and don't have to cost too much. There are cute Mylar balloons that look like various sports items (soccer/tennis/base-/foot-balls, bats, etc.). Mylar balloons are much more expensive than the regular latex balloons, so I often purchase just one or two Mylars to match my theme, and group them with a bunch of latex ones as "filler" (maybe in your school's colors?).

If you could get your hands on some of the green deck carpeting to make it look like a golf green you could use that in some way. Maybe even set up a mini-putt course around the room or just a practice putt green in a corner of the room.

Get various balls and set in the center of the tables as centerpieces. You can use a football stand for the footballs and you can find any kind of ring (diving rings from swimming pool kits, embroidery rings, etc.) to set the round balls in the center of the tables to hold them onto the table. Place balloon bouquets along with them.

Use sport jersies over the backs of the chairs. Or if you are using the cafeteries tables, you can set several chairs up by the podium or if there is a check-in table you can slip them over those chairs.

Make pretend "retired" jersies in frames out of posterboard. Use funny names like the coaches name or the principal or a teacher that is not likely to be sport-worthy. Or honor a known athlete (past or present) with their name on the jersies.

Most party stores have plastic serving bowls and trays in the design of sport balls or you could design your own by buying trays in the colors of the ball you are desiging and paint or use marker to draw the desing on each one.

Depending on how formal this is, instead of drinking glasses, you could give each person a sports bottle to drink from. You could also set up a mock Gatorade bench as seen on football fields and they can refill their own drinks or just have empty Gatorade jugs for decoration.

Depending on how much room you have, you could use portable soccer nets just pushed up against the wall, or set in a corner of the room with soccer balls around it.

Set a golf ball on each plate with their name on it if you are having arranged seating. If you set the napking on the plate and the ball on top of the napkin it won't roll aruond.

Also...Most schools have rolls of colored paper for school projects or for pin-up boards in the halls. You could use the green paper and get several pieces and tape together and cut into a warbled shape like a putting practice mat.

If your cafeteria floor is not already marked for a basketball court, you could use colored tape to make it look that way or even to look like a football field with the numbers marked on the sidelines.

I saw something like this on tv, can't remember what show but they took real sports balls, such as soccer, basketball, football et, and cut top of of them, then put container for water and put fresh flowers in them, I am thinking of using this at the father's day brunch at church, but with mineture sports balls, just can't figure how to incorporate other sports into theme such as golf and baseball because these arn't hollow.

Several years ago our booster clubs were in a money crunch. We covered the long tables with the large rolls of white colored paper with crepe paper of our school colors down the middle. We filled the white areas of the table with photos that were taken all year long at the different sporting events (it was very important to make sure every athlete had as many pictures as possible). Clear plastic vinyl found at a fabric store was placed over the tables. It has become a great tradition to walk around the banquet room and see all the pictures.

9 inch circles were cut out of donated wood that were painted to resemble basketballs, baseballs or softballs. Each ball had the athlete's name, number, and the year on it. The balls were set along the middle of the tables in inexpensive plate stands. After the banquet, the athletes were able to collect autographs of their teammates and take home their photographs (we provided permanent markers for the athletes).

This has become a great money saver as well as a way to not struggle with coming up with an idea or theme. Hope you enjoy!

Pool-Mom

October 31, 20091 found this helpful

Here's an easy centerpiece we used for a water polo banquet. All stuff from the dollar store. And printed clipart on yellow paper spray mounted to foam core.