The mom who built a system so you don’t have to build one yourself.
Pool party planning, done properly. From a Nashville backyard — and one summer that changed everything.
I never intended to become a pool party planner. I just wanted to be the mom who made it look easy.
For a few years, I pulled that off. Mostly.
I had good taste. I had a pool. I had Pinterest and genuine enthusiasm. I could theme a party table in an afternoon and make it look like it took a week. What I didn’t have — and didn’t realize I didn’t have — was a real system.
Then the summer Lily turned seven arrived, and I said yes to a pool party for twenty-five kids.
I had the theme locked in within an hour. I spent three weeks curating a tropical tablescape — the exact right shade of coral napkins, a tiered stand with pineapple props, fresh flowers from the farmer’s market. It was genuinely beautiful.
What I didn’t have was a plan. Not a real one. Just sixty-four Pinterest pins, good intentions, and seventeen browser tabs.
Thirty-one people showed up instead of twenty-five. The food ran out by 2pm. The playlist died because nobody charged the speaker. I spent the entire afternoon running between the kitchen and the food table, trying to hold everything together from the inside.
I was not at my own pool party.
By the time the last guest left, I could have told you every dish on the table and almost nothing about what happened in my own backyard. I had hosted the whole thing from the inside of my kitchen.
I sat on the edge of that pool and I made myself a promise.
“Never again without a system. Never again spending my own pool party in the kitchen.”
I spent the next year building that system. Testing it at every party I threw. Refining it, borrowing from my design background, throwing out what didn’t work and doubling down on what did.
The parties got better. More importantly, I actually got to be at them. I was in the water with Jake. I was sitting with my friends instead of running past them. I was the host who looked relaxed because she actually was.
Friends started asking for the system. Then friends of friends. Then people I’d never met were emailing me for the checklist. That’s when I realized it needed a proper home.
poolpartyplanner.com is that home. It’s a free resource for anyone planning a pool party: guides for the food, the decor, the theme, the games and the guest list, a free checklist you can print, and Look Books (for the price of a coffee) for when you want the outfits sorted too!
Beautiful and stress-free are not opposites.
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“The most beautiful party is the most organized one.
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“I never want another mom to spend her own pool party in the kitchen.
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“Planning is not a chore. It is what makes everything else possible.
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“You do not need to choose between gorgeous and stress-free. You just need the right system.
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“A pool party should feel effortless for the host. That is the whole point.
After a few years, a friend said: put it in writing.
The free Pool Party Planning Checklist is the system I still use: every step, from six weeks out to after the last guest leaves. It is what I wish I had had the summer Lily turned seven.
And if you want the outfits sorted too, there’s a series of Look Books: each with 12 pool and resort outfits, a 2027 color edit and a 3-minute outfit formula, in a 20-page PDF made for your phone.
The checklist is free. Each Look Book is a one-time $5 PDF.
Questions, ideas, or just want to share how your party went?
I read every message. I can’t always reply to everything, but I genuinely love hearing from hosts — the ones planning their first pool party and the ones who have been doing it for years.
