If you’ve got a big party planned, you might need some help. Getting your house ready for a load of visitors can be stressful, but it needn’t be. Whether you’re having a kids party or a more grown-up gathering, you should follow these simple steps to make your life much easier. Some of these tips might seem self-explanatory, but you’d be surprised how many people forget them.

Get Catering Sorted

First thing’s first with a party: you’ll need plenty of food and drink. If you can afford it and want to really impress your guests, you could get outside catering, including staff to help make the evening run much more smoothly.

However, most people want to do it themselves when they cater for a home party. If that’s the case for you, there are still some things you can do to make it run a bit more smoothly.

Try getting in plenty of pre-made stuff from the supermarket, so you don’t have to spend hours preparing snacks. If you are going to cook things yourself, do it well in advance, so you aren’t rushing just before people start arriving—or even after they’ve started arriving. 

If you’ve got adults coming to your party, make sure you’ve got plenty of alcohol. It’s probably better to buy too much rather than run out. You can always use anything that’s left over at another time. Make sure you’ve also got enough plastic cups so that people don’t have to use your standard drinkware.

Make Sure You’ve Got Enough Furniture

One thing many people forget about parties is that they often don’t have enough tables and chairs. This is especially common for people having their party outside. People will need space to sit down, and normal families don’t often have the furniture for lots of people. If you can’t borrow from people you know, you might want to rent some furniture. You might especially need more chairs if you’re having a kids party and want to play games with them.

If you’re in New York, space can be limited, so furniture options are limited as well. Make sure to search extensively for a table and chair rental NY service to help provide furniture for your party.

Get the entertainment sorted

If you want to keep things simple, you can just put out some music on in the background or try these 5 Fun Birthday Party Games. This is normally enough for most people. However, if you want to do something impressive, try hiring a local band or another type of entertainer.

If you remember being impressed by the entertainment at someone else’s party – you could hire the same entertainer. Or if you want to try something different, you could think outside the box a little. There are tons of options out there, especially for a kids party.

You could try a magician or a local comedian to give guests something to remember really.

Clear any valuables

If you’ve got lots of people arriving, you might want to clear away any valuables just in case.