Organizing a party?
Email your info to locals@codepink.org to add your party to our calendar of actions and get support with the planning!

• Hosting a house party is a great way to build partnerships with other organizations and learn from each other while getting together with friends and fellow activists away from the picket lines, jail cells and down from the trees.
• At your Peace Pie Party you can spread the word about the cost of war in your community, the war-centered Federal budget, ways to transform our tax dollars away from militarism and into life-affirming activities.
• Or pick another theme related to ending the occupation - host a card party with our war criminals card deck and educate your community about the need to hold the former Bush administration accountable. Host a story telling evening and invite veterans, military family members, and seasoned activists to share their stories.

"Yes, yes," you say. "I want to host a house party! Now what?" Follow this recipe for creating a fulfilling and meaningful houseparty and you'll be set for a successful night!

Ingredients:

• 1 location (café, living room, community center, library)
• 1 outreach email and flyer listing event date, time, and location and inviting people to bring a dish to share
• 1 facebook event or CODEPINK website calendar listing
• 1 petition or sign-in sheet to gather contact info
• Several friends to help planning, outreach, set-up, clean-up
• 10-20 copies of the Federal budget pie chart flyer (download from
  warresisters.org/federalpiechart or free postcards at notmypriorities.org)
• 1 fact sheet on how much your state pays for war (download from nationalpriorities.org)
• 1 deck of CODEPINK War Criminal Cards to use
• 1 delicious pie baked with love from a recipe in CODEPINK's Peace Pie Cookbook
• Plates, cups, silverware and serving utensils for potluck dishes
• 1 video or documentary on the Iraq war, the occupation of Afghanistan, or the cost of war at home
  

Instructions:

1. Make a guest list. Think about which friends, neighbors, coworkers, members of your faith community that you may invite to your party. You may also want to invite community organizations and veterans groups to partner with you. What groups in your community are working to save local resources, like public schools, domestic violence shelters, soup kitchens, free clinics? What small businesses may be interested in rallying for more funds for Main Street, not Wall Street and war profiteers? What interfaith, peace and justice, and cultural groups can you reach out to?
2. Set the time, date and location of your party.
3. Invite. Create an email and a flyer to invite people to your party.
4. Ask partner organizations to invite their members to attend the party. Spread the word far and wide on email listserves, website calendars, the walls of your local café, radio and newspaper event listings, and by outreaching the old fashioned way: picking up the phone and calling people to invite them to your party. Consider also inviting friendly members of the press.
5. Plan the fun and facts. Will you have music? Will you have a speaker? Will you show a documentary or short youtube clip? Rethink Afghanistan has a great series on the cost of war at www.rethinkafghanistan.org
   Notes: Are you interested in having card games with CODEPINK's War Criminals deck? Playing with the cards is a great way to educate your friends about known war criminals who should be held accountable for their crimes sending our country into debt and war unnecessarily. You can have several games going or have one big tournament!
   Alternatively, you could host a "Peace Pie Bake Sale" and hold your event at the local farmer's market or outside on a busy street. Feature on your table this well-known quote: "It will be a great day when our schools get all the money they need and the Air Force has to hold a bake sale to buy a bomber!"
6. Provide Food. You went to parties as a kid because of the cupcakes and sundaes. You went to philanthropic meetings in college because of the free pizza. Things have not changed. Host a "Pizza, Pie and Peace Party"! The menu and game is up to you, but give your community a reason to come other than facts and figures! Make it a potluck and invite people to bring dishes as well. And of course you have many delicious pie recipes in this book to choose from!
7. Decorate with Pink. You can make signs that say what your community could fund instead of buying war. For trade-off numbers by state, visit www.nationalpriorities.org. Hang up photos of important local resources in need of funding, like schools, libraries, public parks and bridges. Consider having an art table with pens and paper where people can draw what they'd buy instead. For artistic inspiration, check out the draw-in photos at bringourwardollarshome.org.
8. Get set, go! Make sure EVERYONE feels welcome. Consider having a greeter or passing around name tags. Once folks have arrived, turn the music and invite the crowd into a group activity, to hear a speaker, or watch a film right away to stimulate group discussion.
9. Make the call. At some point during the party, flicker the lights, turn down the music and invite your guests to get out their cell phones. Ask them to call their Congressperson and ask her or him to stop funding war and bring their tax dollars home to communities in need. Read them the phone number for the congressional switchboard - (202) 225-3121 (or call ahead and get the direct # for your Congressperson's office). Don't worry if it's late. The switchboard will be operating and you can always leave a message for your Congressperson. Democracy never sleeps!
10. Don't forget to dance! Because as Emma Goldman, who vehemently opposed runaway capitalist greed and power, said, "If I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution."
11. Follow up. Post photos or videos from your house party online and on social networks. Email all your guests and partner organizations to thank them for joining in the informative and fun evening and mention any next steps and upcoming actions. Might we suggest a next step for your community? Pass a city resolution against further war funding! Keep building the momentum! Mmmm… revolution never tasted so sweet!