Holiday Bunco Party (Printables Included!)
Last week I invited a group of my favorite lady friends over for a holiday party with cocktails and Bunco – a fun dice game I grew up playing as a kid. While Bunco was a big deal in my San Diego suburb, apparently it’s appeal isn’t as mass as I thought it was because not one of the 11 friends I invited over had ever played. But, that made it more exciting – getting to introduce friends to the guaranteed good time that is BUNCO, plus holiday music, cocktails, and food sounded like a perfect night! As I’m sure you can imagine, the party was a hit – everyone loved playing…we even talked about making it a monthly league. For the party, I designed a handful of pieces including the invite, score cards, and table numbers…plus I whipped up a dice cake, cookies, and a few fun paper dice that I used as gift boxes for the prizes. Since the score cards and table numbers are essential to any Bunco party, I wanted to be able to offer a printable for those items in case any of you were interested in hosting your own Bunco party. I’ve partnered with Avery so that you can print – AND even customize the score cards and table numbers if you’d like. Continue on for the printables, photos, and a checklist for anyone planning their own Bunco party! For my table numbers, I wanted to use the Avery Textured White Menu Cards #80505 or #16110 (buy them on Amazon HERE), as each sheet of paper has 3 lightly-perforated sections, which makes them perfect for upright table numbers. After printing each sheet, I just taped the open side together with a piece of scotch tape. I also filled plastic sleeves with the required pencils and dice needed per table and printed a second set of table numbers to go in the sleeves to make sure everything stayed secure on the tables beforehand. You can use the designs I made and download/print the PDF versions of the table cards on Avery #80505 or #16110 Menu Cards (or any nice 8.5 x 11” white paper) HERE: 1 / 2 / 3. If you’d like to customize my design a bit more (change the size of the text or number, add your own text, change the colors, etc.), download the Avery files HERE: 1 / 2 / 3 and save to your computer. To open the .avery file provided go to avery.com/templates and select “Open a Saved Project”. You will need to sign in or create an account, then select “upload project” to open the saved file where you can easily personalize.
For my score cards, I used the Avery Half-Fold Greeting Cards #3265 (buy them on Amazon HERE) because I just love the weight and feel of the paper. The center fold also makes it easy to cut straight down the center between the two cards. If you are happy with the look of the cards, you can download and print the PDF version HERE. If you’d like to customize the score card (change the text, colors, etc.) download the Avery file HERE and save to your computer. To open the .avery file, go to avery.com/templates and select “Open a Saved Project”. Select “upload project” to open the saved file and customize to your liking. And don’t worry, I removed the ornaments from my score card design, since they won’t make much sense after December 25th. I also changed the wording of “Round One and Two” to “Game One and Two” since that caused a little confusion during my party.
And lastly, here’s a peek at the food spread. That dice cake was a vanilla cake with a pistachio buttercream interior. The exterior was frosted with a pink vanilla buttercream and the little dice dots were made from fondant. The cookies were rolled sugar cookies, frosted with buttercream. And just in case that wasn’t enough dessert for 12 people (lol), there was also chocolate cupcakes and an assortment of candy to snack on during game play. I didn’t get any great photos of the food setup, but you can see a little of it below. There was a large cheese plate that I had fun making, plus a veggie plate, crackers, cranberry & cheese puff pastry bites, pigs in a blanket, and spinach & kale bites. Funny enough, I spent hours making these lasagna cupcakes the day prior and then totally forgot to take them out of the refrigerator and reheat them for the party! I’ve been eating lasagna cupcakes for the past 5 days! ha
Perhaps you’re inspired to host your own Bunco game after hearing about mine?! If so, here’s a checklist I put together for you to reference before your party.
BUNCO CHECKLIST
- INVITES: Invite a group of friends over. It’s ideal to have an even 12 players total.
- RULES: Learn the rules for the game HERE
- SUPPLIES:
- Dice: Order dice. I ordered the cute pink dice off Amazon HERE (I’d recommend 2 packs, just to be safe)
- Head Table Bell: Make sure to have a bell at the head table. I had an antique one my mom brought me, but HERE is a similar one on Amazon
- Pencils + Paper: Gather together pencils and scratch paper – you’ll need 1 pencil/person and 1 pad of paper/table
- SEATING: If you’re going to have 12 players, make sure to have 12 seats and 3 designated tables for 4 people each (4 people/table)
- PRIZES: Buy some fun, cheap gifts for prizes. I had prizes wrapped for: Highest Points Total, Most Wins, and then also had a booby prize for the Most Losses
- The booby prize was some fun pink plush car dice which I bought on Amazon HERE
- The highest points and most wins prizes were an assortment of goodies that included some cute dice hair bows I DIY’d using pre-made bows, dice (from my personal Scrabble set! ha), and hair clips.
- PRINTABLES – PRINT:
- 1 score card / player. I made my cards for two games total, each with the typical 6 rounds. If you plan to play more, you can print 2 cards / player or you can further customize those cards on Avery.com.
- Table number tent cards
- FOOD & DRINKS: Plan a menu for food or snacks and drinks a few days ahead of time, so you’re not too stressed with party prep day-of!