Create your own political party

'You invited how many people?" I asked in a panic, after my husband, Dan, informed me he had volunteered our house for a campaign fundraiser.

"The e-mail went to 800 households."

"At two adults per house, that could be sixteen hundred people."

"They won't all come."

"How will we know?"

"RSVPs."

"Are you joking? Folks these days think RSVP means Responding Seems Very Pointless."

"We'll have 100 max."

"Based on what scientific formula?"

"It's just wine and cheese."

"Just," he says. Why do men think all it takes to throw a party is hanging a sign on a freeway bridge and putting out wheelbarrows of pretzels and cold beer?

Dan got us into this because he's on the homeowners association board. In this prestigious role, he gets to listen to people complain at all hours, sit through eye-glazing meetings with bloviating officials, and receive no money. Now we get to host the town.

"It's not just wine and cheese," I assure him as the day nears. "It's blitzing the house so it sparkles, hiding the dirty laundry, rounding up enough wine glasses, setting up tables, finding theme-colored linens, making platters, getting plates and nametags, arranging flowers, decorating, fumigating the dogs and figuring out parking."

"Don't make this so complicated," he says.

I begin to wonder whether anyone suspected the wives in presidential assassinations.

The winning party

On political party day, while Dan got the wine and cheese, I arranged tightly packed red roses and white Fuji mums in vases, took our two fluffy white bichon frises to the groomers and ordered red and blue collar bows.

I launched prayers to the weather gods asking for an evening nice enough to host everyone on the deck.

That evening, a respectable yet manageable crowd of a hundred people turned out. (How did Dan know?) The weather held. Money flowed in. Wine flowed out. The candidate spoke and promised to help protect our little road.

After we washed the last platter and fell into bed, I thought about the pretty road at the heart of our community. If this night saved it, I decided, then all the trouble was worth the cause. But I didn't tell Dan.

If you, too, open your home for a political party, here are some creative pointers from Joe Richter, director of catering for the Four Seasons in Washington, D.C., where political events happen almost daily:

• Focus on fun. At these events, people want great drinks and atmosphere more than great food, he said. For colors, go red, white and blue.
• Pour on the patriotism. Beyond red and white wine, consider pouring pomegranate mojito or blue Curaçao cocktails, and coconut rum drinks in white glasses to spike the party. Skewer fruit garnishes with flag-wrapped toothpicks.
• Add flower power. Make arrangements out of red and white roses or carnations, blue irises, or white Fuji mums. Stick American flags in the vases, and wrap with patriotic ribbon.
• Table the drama. For an inexpensive, dramatic centerpiece, fill large, clear glass hurricane-style vases with water. Add blue or red food coloring. Float a white candle. Measure your dining room tabletop. Have your local home store cut Plexiglas to fit. Cover the table with a collage of campaign literature, news clips and candidate photos. Put the Plexiglas on top. You protect the table, spark conversations, and can use the Plexiglas for future parties.
• Saturate the event with campaign literature. Put buttons, brochures and bumper stickers in tall vases or baskets lined with a patriotic print fabric. At a discount store buy cheap 12- by 14-inch picture frames. Fill the image area with a montage of campaign materials, replace the glass, and use the transformed frame as a serving tray.
• Use candidate cutouts. Order cookie cutters of McCain and Obama busts online. Use them to cut out finger sandwiches, petits fours. pinafores, mini pizzas or cookies.
• Make music minimal. If you want music, have no more than a piano player. Time the candidate's remarks to take place exactly halfway through the party.
• Be discreet about money. If soliciting donations, have a box in clear view, but don't make it central. Put something humorous on it like "Poor Box."
• It's all for the party. Focus on the cause, not the hassle, and remember: The greatest political causes start in homes, not capitols.