Down Set Hike

 

 

Ethan's birthday party this year was seriously one of the easiest ones I have ever done.  He wanted a football party.  And so, on the last day of November, the greatest month for football, we gathered a group of rough and tumble boys, and we had ourselves a party.

 

 

 

A good old fashioned football party.

I didn't have to plan much really.  After they arrived we played one game.  Racing helmets.  They each had a card with their name on it and they placed their card on the helmet they thought would win.  I then rolled the dice and moved the helmets according to the dice roll.  They cheered and clapped for their teams and we played it over and over again.  I had to make them stop, because we had other, more important things to do.

 

Like scarf down some cake and ice cream. 

I think they were done in less than 3 minutes.

 

 

These boys couldn't wait to get outside.

These boys were ready for some football.

I really don't remember how I used to do parties without my older kids.  I sent the boys outside and my older boys totally took over.  They lined everybody up, divided them into teams, passed out the flags and of coarse, explained the rules for safe play.  And I just turned around, walked into the house, and sat on the couch and visited with my sister.  It was the best party ever.

And then they played football.

 

And despite the rules and the refs, I have to admit there were some injuries, but, these were boys and this was football and they were tough so they played right through the pain and the tears. 

And wouldn't you if you had cute cheerleaders, like these, cheering you on?

They played football until the sun went down, literally.  They were having so much fun.  When their moms came to pick them up they were red faced, sweaty, dirty and smiling ear to ear.  And I hopped up from my comfortable position on the couch to hand them their goody bag and thank them for coming. 

 

 Like I said, best party ever. 

 

 I think the boys would agree.

 

 

 

a party for my 10 year oldl

10 friends.

10 games.

10 toppings at the ice cream bar.

10 reasons to come and celebrate at Alyssa's 10th birthday party!



10 toppings:  Hot fudge, nuts, coconut, cherries, sprinkles, butterfinger, caramel, M&M's, oreos and whip cream.  Yummo!

Game #1:  Pop the balloon to find out what the next game would be.

Game #2:  Cheeto toss.  Throw Cheetos at the poor girl with the shaving creamed shower cap on.  The team with the most Cheetos that stick wins.

Game #3:  Head Banz

Game #4:  Guess how many candies are in the candy jar.

Game #5:  Rollik (reverse charades)  Definitely a favorite.

Game #6:  Spray bottle squirt.  Pick a category (fruit, candy bars, colors) the one in the middle with the spray bottle thinks of a color and then asks everyone their color and if it is the same one she is thinking she sprays them and then they are it.

Game #7:  Licorice chew.  Who can eat it the fastest without hands.



Game #8:  Cotton ball scoop.  And old favorite from my childhood. 

Game #9:  Sticker Tag.  Each girl has a sheet of stickers and they all run around trying to stick them on each other.  The object of the game is to get rid of all of your stickers and avoid having a sticker stuck on you. 

And here is where my camera stopped working.  So, no pictures of Game #10:  Apples to Apples, no pictures of these cute girls eating their ginormous ice cream sundaes, no pictures of present opening, no more pictures period. 

I was sad x 10!

But, despite my broken camera, I had 10 happy friends and 1 very happy birthday girl.

And that's what really matters.



True Princesses

Last year Ashlyn really wanted a princess party, but she had too many "boy" friends so we opted for a Candyland party instead.  This year there was no getting out of it. 

A Princess Party she wanted. 

 A Princess Party it would be.

We sent out the invitation inviting all maidens in the kingdom to come to the party.  At the party they would undergo several tests to determine if they were indeed true princesses.  They were instructed to come dressed in their rags (normal clothes).  This was apparently uspetting to some. 
"But mom, I don't want to wear rags!" 

When the maidens arrived they were each given a bag of pink play dough.  They were then instructed to make it "royal"  They could choose between all colors of glitter that they sprinkled on their play dough and then kneaded it in to make it sparkle.  They also each choose a gem to mix in.  Their sparkly princess play dough was then placed in their goody bag.

The first game was Snow White's pass the poison apple.  They passed around an apple to music.  When the music stopped and they were left holding the apple....

...they had to take a bite. 
And if they were a true princess, well, then this would happen:

And wouldn't you know it, all of those maidens fell to the ground - very dramatically, actually - eyes closed, arms spread; they were very serious about this princess testing.

Test #1 was passed with flying colors.

The next test was Ariel's underwater gem hunt.  They all sat around this bowl filled with soapy water.  I told them that they each had to reach into the water and try to pull out a gem.  If they pulled out a gem they were a true princess.  If they pulled out a black rock, they were not.  To get them started I took a turn.  I reached in and pulled out a black rock.  They gasped and felt very sad for me that I wasn't a princess.  (I actually was holding the only black rock as I slipped my hand in) 

After my mishap they were all very nervous when their turn came

But against all odds, they all found gems.  It was a true princess miracle.

Next they had to pass the Rapunzel-frying-pan walk.  They put on the Rapunzel hair, grabbed the frying pan...

...and carefully carried the pink balloon across the room and back.

It was difficult, yes.  That hair is heavy and the balloon light; it could have very easily floated out of the pan, but they pulled through and another test was successfully completed.

After reading them the story of the Princess and the Pea they attempted this test.  Could they sit on each of these pillows and guess where the pea was?

Yes, yes they could.  An obvious sign of a true princess.

We then prepared for Cinderella's glass slipper test.

If the shoe fit, they must be princesses. 

And sure enough, every one of those dainty feet fit slid right into that glass slipper. 

Their final test was from Jasmine and it was my favorite.  They had to take a jewel...

...and without touching any other treasures, tiptoe through the course and...

...gently deposit their jewel in the magic lamp.  And after some close calls, they all completed this difficult test.

Having successfully passed each and every test to determine who was a true princess, their fairy godmother arrived, tapped them all on the head and transformed them all.

From plain maidens dressed in rags to the beautiful glorious princesses that they really are.

And then it was time to celebrate.

To celebrate this princess. 

This little princess and all of her royal friends. 

 It was a grand celebration indeed.

 

Some notes:

*I did provide a new apple for each round of the pass the apple game, so there were no germs being spread around.  That would have been very un-princess like.

*The Rapunzel hair was Sarah's masterpiece for a Halloween costume.  The girls were dying over it.

*When I did this party for Alyssa on the Cinderella game I had a pair of dress up shoes from the dollar store for each girl.  They got to take them home as part of the goody bag.  Wouldn't you know that this year the dollar store didn't have any dress up shoes.  So, I dug through the dress-up bin to find my glass slipper and just used that on each girl.

*All of the jewels and beads are things we have collected over the years.   They are stored in a treasure chest in the playroom and are played with almost daily by my kids.  And that Aladdin genie lamp? Well, that is probably the best fifty cents I ever spent at D.I.

Lego party

Ethan is all of a sudden into Legos.

So he really wanted a Lego birthday party this year. Not a problem, I have done Lego parties before, I can easily do one again.

Plus...

... I have bins and bins of Legos all over this house, which makes planning and carrying out this party pretty darn easy and pretty darn cheap. So we went ahead with it and here are the results.


The table.
Classic Lego colors of red, blue, green and yellow. The one detail you can't see in this picture, which I'm guessing non of the boys noticed either, was the six circles drawn on the napkins to make them look like giant Legos. I scattered Lego pieces all over the table and propped up some Lego books. In the goody bags I put a can of soda, several small candy bars, airheads, a sucker and a bag of those small candy Lego bricks. I also put some of the candy Legos on top of the cupcakes.

Each game and activity had a colored Lego attached to it. The boys would pick a Lego out of a bowl and whatever color they picked, that is the game/activity we would do.

The first Lego chosen was gray which meant we started off with the Lego shuffle. We cranked some birthday music and the boys walked around the circle. When the music stopped they jumped on a certain color and if I picked that color Lego out of the bowl they got a piece of candy. If I chose the color white, everyone got a candy. We did this over and over again until they had all gotten their fill of candy.

Brown was chosen next so we played the Lego Toss. They all picked out 10 Legos and then had to try to toss them into the different size bowls. Very basic game, but they enjoyed it, especially when they got a sweet point when a Lego would hit the carpet first and then bounce into the bowl. Now that is exciting.

Yellow meant the Lego spoon relay. They divided into 2 teams and each had to take a spoon and scoop as many Legos as they could and then carry them across the room to dump in a small bowl. After each boy had a turn we added up all of the Legos to see who had the most.

My favorite game at this party was the "guess my Mini-figure" game. I came up with this idea literally minutes before the party. I taped different mini- figures to an index card and then put them in some headbands from another game we had. They couldn't see their own mini-figure and each had to ask different questions to guess who they were.

They loved this game as much as I did.

(Their mini-figures were Yoda, a pirate, Harry Potter, Doby, a clown, Darth Vader and Indiana Jones)

The green brick sent them on a hunt for mini-figures. I had hidden about 40 (yes we have over 40 mini-figures) around the living room. They came back and counted them out. I also gave a special prize to the person who had found the mer-man mini-figure. Really? A mer-man? You have got to give a special prize for that one.

I strategically made sure they picked the red brick last. Red was the Lego sort. All of the Legos had gotten mixed up after all the games. I dumped them all out in front of them, set the timer and told them to sort the colors, which they happily and frantically did to beat the time. And then my party was all cleaned up.

Brilliant, if I do say so myself.

We also enjoyed opening presents (mostly Legos, of coarse ) eating cake and ice cream, watching parts of a free Lego DVD that came with the Lego magazine my boys get (which the boys were glued to and could have probably watched the whole time) and just some plain old creative Lego building. It was a success. An easy, cheap (I think the whole party cost me under $15) success.

And my boy was happy.

And that's really what makes it all worth it.

Happy Building!