Easy Summer Party Favor: BBQ Rub

Y'all know I like to throw a good party.  Of course, those are harder to squeeze in now with the little man around.  But last weekend we helped my parents host a couples shower for my godmother's son and his bride-to-be.  It was a relaxed, casual affair held outside with catered BBQ and checkered tablecloths.  The weather was perfect - it was such a fun night!  And of course I raised my hand excitedly to handle the favors.  Party favors are never necessary, but I LOVE to do them.  And my absolute thrill is finding something fun that looks amazing and costs mere pennies. 

So my usual rules on favors are these... (1) Never do them merely for the sake of doing them.  People don't need more crap and you don't owe them anything.  (2) Make it something consumable.  Either edible or usable in some other way.  Cheap little trinkets usually wind up in a junk drawer, the trash bin, or up Junior's nose in less than 24 hours.  So why waste your time and money on that?  (3) Keep favors in theme with the party.  And particularly if you're talking wedding favors, make it personal to the couple.

I love all aspects of party planning... I'm already in the throws of planning Sam's first birthday shindig.  Yeah, he'll be 4 mos next week.  But y'all, there is so much to do!  I only have 8 months left!  I've got the theme, color scheme, and his outfit already worked out.  Neurotic - I know.  More on that later... but yes, of all the party planning fun, favors are my absolute FAVORITE part.  So I thought I'd just share this last one I did because it's so stinkin' easy and great for all kinds of summer parties...

Homemade BBQ Rub Party Favors

There are a million good BBQ rub recipes online, but here is the one I found and used.  It has only a few ingredients, all of which are cheap or I already had on hand.  I also love the Allrecipes site because they let you play with the quantities and recalculate the ingredient needs for you.  For this particular rub, you'll need...

- 5 parts white sugar

- 5 parts brown sugar

- 2 parts salt

- 1 part black pepper

- 1 part paprika

For the favors, I did 1/3 cup servings.  The hub and I tested it out on some grilled chicken and it was (a) delicious and (b) more than enough in the packet for us to use on three large chicken breasts.  How you package them is totally up to you.  I got some small clear treat bags from Michael's (4x6 I think) for the outer wrapper, and then mini ziplock bags (3x4 maybe?) to actually hold the rub.  The outer wrappers were merely folded over and secured with ribbon (already had on hand) and sticker labels.  Back in the day I would've designed and printed my own labels.  This time I recruited Tiny Prints.  They were cheap, matched the invites, and also uber cute.  I did, however, print plain white labels for the back of the packets that shared the recipe and instructions for the rub.   I already had a bunch of different size labels on hand, so for me there was very little cost to make these 40 favors.  We had to buy a few ingredients, the main labels, and the bags - totaling about $33.  If I had made my own labels, that amount would be nearly sliced in half. 

So if nothing else, make some of this rub for yourself - it's delish!  I also plan to make another batch this weekend for a couple of teacher appreciation gifts.  Yeah, I was just clued in to the fact that next week is Teacher Appreciation Week and we are "encouraged" to bring themed gifts EACH day for Sam's teachers at daycare.  I had no prior knowledge of the world of teacher gifts... I've never been a teacher or had a kid in a class, so this is an entirely new thing for me.  I've been trading ideas with friends and searching blogs and Pinterest... and holy hell at some of the gifts these Martha McCrafty's out there do.  I actually enjoy this kind of stuff... receiving gifts is one of my love languages and I LOVE LOVE LOVE giving.  But I would've appreciated more than one week's notice to gather this shit together.  So yeah I've been in overdrive the last couple of days getting these gifts together.  More on that later... I will take pics of our daily prezzies!

Tomorrow I'm off work but Nana and Gran will be keeping Sam in the morning while I get the house ready for weekend company.  One of the hub's best buds is getting married this weekend, so we've got an exciting few days ahead.  Hope you all have fantastic weekends!  Back soon...