January Christmas Party

Our Southwest Airlines employees in Omaha had our annual holiday party last night. It was held at the Holiday Inn Ameristar (The Ameristar is one of our local casinos) in the Lewis and Clark banquet room. The room was beautifully decorated with two separate Christmas trees in opposite corners of each other. The long table that held our food had lovely ornaments laying amongst the pans with sections of bridal ribbon that you might use to decorate a bouquet of flowers or any other craft project. The dessert table had deep red napkins atop a white table cloth with a couple different heights to make a display that you may see in a magazine. The desserts themselves were so perfectly made that they appeared to be fake! And all the dining tables had been set with Christmas themed centerpieces that had greenery mixed in with Poinsettias all sprinkled with glitter. There were also deep red napkins at each place that matched the dessert table.

The hours devours table had a vegetable and relish tray and a cheese, sausage and cracker tray. There was also a bowl of Champagne Punch, a very tasty drink indeed! Everything was so nice! We had gone to meet with the banquet manager prior to our party and selected our menu in advance so we knew what we would be eating. The meal started with a garden salad and assorted toppings and dressings. Then we moved on to the buffet that had the following choices: Roast beef, chicken cordon bleu, pecan crusted salmon, twice baked mashed potatoes and glazed baby carrots. Dessert choices were German chocolate cake, carrot cake, pumpkin pie and New York cheesecake. Water, iced tea, coffee and milk were included. Everyone had 2 free drinks and from there they were on their own.

I arrived a little bit early as I was helping another girl get all the gifts for the employees carried in from her car. We also had to put disposable cameras on all the tables and Southwest themed gifts at each place. As each guest arrived we gave them two free drink coupons and each employee drew a number that would be used in our gift drawing later in the evening. It was fun to see everyone with their spouse or date. Some we hadn't seen since last year's party.

Our entertainment for the evening was a comedian, Austin Anderson, from one of our local comedy clubs, The Funny Bone. He was pretty good, mixing in some jokes about some of our guests along with his own venue of stories and tribulations. Everyone seemed to enjoy him.

After the comedian was gone and the tables were cleared, we commenced with the gift drawing. We made a game out of it. The first person to draw picks an envelope. After opening it to see what they won, they are done until the very end. The following people that draw can either steal what the previous person drew or pick a new envelope and see what they get. And so it continues. Each prize or gift can only be stolen 2 times. After all prizes or gifts have been drawn for, the very first person to draw has the option of stealing (or actually trading) his prize with another person's that is still available. Get it? It's so fun and everyone loves it! We had a couple people keeping track of how many times each thing was stolen so that no one could argue the issue! I came home with a Samsung Blu-Ray DVD player. Prior to the party and before Christmas, Lisa (from work) and I went shopping at Best Buy. We ended up with some great deals with all the specials for the holiday that were happening. Throughout the year, we raise money for our party simply from our 2 pop machines that everyone at the airport has access to. It's amazing how much we can get from them! That's how we afforded our gifts from Best Buy!
We spent roughly $2800.00 for all the gifts so that each employee in our station would receive something.
After the party was over, several of us walked over to the Ameristar to try our luck. I actually had won $56 dollars on a penny slot machine but ended up with a total loss of $40. Then it was time to go home. All in all a very fun evening!