2009 March | Creative Party Place

Mission….. Army Theme Birthday Party

This party was originally hosted by Julie at Through My Eyes
(Julie’s blog is private, so you will not be able to visit her blog unless you are an invited reader.)
______________________________________________________

This has to be one of the BEST army themed parties I’ve seen! Julie went all out with this theme. She totally set the tone with her invitation envelopes alone! I’m sure when those little boys got their invites they couldn’t wait for the party!

The “enlistment desk”…..genius! The photo op wall…..brilliant!
The goodie bags…..oh so fun and creative!

Be sure to look this one over ladies! It’s one for the memory books!

Enjoy Julie’s party……
______________________________________________________

Otherwise known as Mission 4.120503 (Connor’s 4th Birthday, born on 12/5/03). We celebrated military style on Saturday and had a great time. I had such a great time with this theme! The invites looked like this…

The text read…
Department of Defense
ATTN: Pvt. Grandma and Grandpa

On this day, you are officially recruited to Pvt. Delamarter’s
Mission 4.120503.
If you choose to accept, please
arrive at promptly 1030 hours on
Saturday December 1st, 2007 at the Delamarter Barracks,
Recruits will perform necessary military tactics to complete the above named mission.
Camouflage fatigues would be
appropriate to avoid enemy fire but not required.
Please RSVP to
Base Commander

I sent them in Manila envelopes with Top Secret and Confidential written on it.

Each of the kids got their picture taken in front of our flag and camo material.

The enlistment desk, where they got their mission, helmet, tatoos, and dog tags.

The Mission Completion Bags….I got stickers and pencils from the local army recruiting store.

Their Mission….

The Cupcakes…

The place settings were pie tins with plates on top and I decorated the table with army soldiers. Food in the ‘mess hall’ was hot dogs, chips, baked beans, and veggies.

Some of our recruits…
We played ‘Sergeant Says’ to start…led by our Sergeants, Caleb and Levi. They look a little disappointed in their recruits…Drop and give me 20!

Tug of War. We then did an obstacle course in the garage that included a tunnel, army crawl, and crawling over furniture. I didn’t get any pictures of that.

I gave each of the kids a air-pop rocket and we had ‘Target Practice”…Ryan was the ‘moving target’!

Wounded Soldier…the kids were in two teams and had to wrap up their ‘wounded soldier’ and drag them across a line.

and finally, a pinata…

Peter Pan Birthday Party

This Off to Neverland party was hosted by Emily over at Toad’s Treasures.
___________________________________________________________

Emily got SUPER CREATIVE with her Neverland theme! She really had some fun stuff for the kids to do. The invitations are fantabulous and I LOVE that she and her husband got in on the dress up action!

Enjoy Emily’s party……
___________________________________________________________
This year for Ethan’s 4th birthday he wanted to have a Peter Pan birthday party. It worked out great since the girls loved to dress up as Tinker Bell (or any other Disney princess)& the boys could dress up as Peter Pan or Captain Hook if they wanted to.

The invitations…
The only thing I wish I would have done was stick some “Pixie Dust” in the envelope with the invite so they could use it to get to “Neverland”!

We also dressed up for fun & the kids LOVED it (the parents got a chuckle out of it too:). The kids especially loved it when Captain Hook chased them around.
Pictured: Captain Hook, Peter Pan, Tinker Bell, & little Schmee
The cake…
Since it was impossible to find a cake pan that looked like the island of Neverland,I made a mold out of tin foil and baked the cake in it.

A few fun details…
Instead of buying stickers of Peter Pan and Tinkerbell I just found some clip art online and printed them out on “sticker paper” & mail address labels! It was great because I used the stickers to decorate the cake (on toothpicks), the party sacks, the invites, and anything else I could think of.

Althougth I don’t have pictures, I also did the following…

-We had the kids make swords (out of card board, tin foil, and electrical tape) and magic wands (out of dowls with plummer’s piping wrapped around them) while we waited for everyone to arrive. They thought it was great.

-At the end of the party we had a “treasure hunt” and at the end they all got their “treasure” which was their party bags filled with stickers, treats, and pens.

-We played pin the “pirate on the map” aka Pin the tail on the donkey, “Peter, Peter, Pan! aka Duck, Duck, Goose, & had a little “cake walk” but we used candy and played music from the movie as they walked.

-I didn’t decorate very much, but I didn’t really need to! I just put up a few green streamers, signs with pictures from different parts of the Neverland Island (mermaid lagoon, skull rock, etc.), & got a tablecloth that looked like a treasure map.

We also made picture frames out of large popsicle sticks that I spray painted green, self sticking foam pieces, and a bit of glitter.

_____________________________________________________

Visit Emily’s blog to see more pictures from the party!