Star Wars Birthday Party

For my son's 8th birthday, he wanted a Star Wars party. And we had a blast with it :D

I downloaded a bunch of Star Wars music and had it playing while the kids arrived and had one of the movies going for the kiddos to watch until everyone got there.

Upon Arrival

When each child entered, he/she got a padawan training badge. I can't find a close up picture but you can kind of see it here. I printed it out on paper with a cloud background.

Each child got to choose a sticker of a Star Wars character for their ID photo and we entered their Star Wars name (their real name spelled backwards - my son Connor became Ronnoc). Their species (human) and planet of origin (Earth) were also listed. These were quickly covered with clear contact paper to laminate them, and strung on a string to hang around their neck.

Below their picture and info were their training tasks (the party games) - when each task was completed, they received a star sticker to place next to the task. And on the back were fun Star Wars trivia questions with multiple choice answers.

I'd also planned on making padawan robes out of cheap brown sheets (just cutting a large square with a neck hole, secured around the waist with twine) for each child, but ran out of time. The kids loved their badges though.

Task 1 - Learn how to build a light saber

I bought several foam pool noodles, cut them into light saber size sections, and bought several rolls of different colored duck tape for the kids to decorate with.

Task 2 - Light saber training

This mostly consisted of roping off an area with streamers and letting the kids go at it (with Daddy as referee calling the winner, who would fight the next padawan). I think this was the most popular game of the day :)

Task 3 - Locate the enemy fleet

I found a fun "Pin the Laser Blast on the Spaceship" game at Party City for about $5. I'd been looking for a poster with all the Star Wars figures to play Pin the Light Saber on the Jedi, but couldn't find one, so finding this game was perfect.

The lanterns above the poster are regular tea party lights that I painted gray to look like mini Death Stars. My son still has these hanging over his bed two years later lol They make perfect night lights!

Task 4 - Destroy the Death Star

For the Death Star pinata, I bought a soccer ball pinata and painted the white areas gray. I've seen some more elaborate versions of these, but this really worked great. We wrapped a bat with duck tape to look like a light saber :)

(my stepson wearing the defeated Death Star on his head) :-D

The Food

Along with pizza, we had:

Padme Pineapples, Greedo Grapes, Organa Oranges, and Skywalker Strawberries

Wookie Cookies

I really lucked out with the Pringles - these were on sale at WalMart (I think a Star Wars anniversary had just happened so Pringles had all these Star Wars character themed chips). We also served Yoda Soda and Vader Juice :)

There was also Jedi Jello squares (black cherry for the awesome color), and light sabers (a bowl of Twizzlers and pretzel sticks dipped in chocolate). You can also sort of see the padawan badge here around Little Man's neck...I printed them out on cloud paper.

The Cake

My son wanted a cake depicting the Battle on Mustafar between Obi Wan and Anakin. So I found some figurines for the top, made a black bottom layer covered in black sugar, a top layer with brown fondant breaking apart with oozing red lava, and the red light sabers along the bottom layer are made with Twizzlers and Tootsie Rolls. I also made a couple T-fighters out of cookies, a large marshmallow and pretzels with details piped on in icing, but they ended up being too heavy to suspend from the cake :) We found the cool Star Wars candle at Party City also.

This was a really fun, and fairly inexpensive, party. For party favors, Party City had a ton of fun stuff. Each child got a little bag with Star Wars tattoos, pencils, pencil sharpeners, notepads, and pinata candy. 

Indiana Jones Birthday Party

My son hit double digits today :(  He's getting way too big too fast! He wanted to do an Indiana Jones birthday party so I got busy googling and found a ton of awesome things to do :) I promised my family a blog post so they could see how it went :D Unfortunately, I didn't get many pictures lol It's hard to play photographer with a bunch of 10 year olds running around! But I did get a few and got some prep shot pics.

I found a lot of great blogs with awesome ideas, but the one we followed the most was HERE (I believe the blog is called Four Little Monkeys...I can't see the blog heading for some reason). So, here's what we did for our party :)

The Invitations:

I found a pic of an old map, downloaded the Indiana Jones fonts, and printed these out. Then I burned the edges a little, rolled them up, and tied them with twine. They turned out really cute!

Upon Arrival:

I made a CD of Indiana Jones music and had it playing and each child who came got their archaeologist on ;)

I made these easy Indy satchels out of brown felt and printed out a paper label (I found a blog that shows you how to print on fabric but I didn't get that fancy. I just sewed the paper right to the bag). 

And each child got an Indy fedora. I found these at Oriental Trading Company. They are New Year's Gangster hats - but I just pulled the New Year's band off and spray painted them brown. They worked great!

The Games:

Our group of archaeologists had seven missions to complete (pared down from nine - the party could have easily lasted another hour with all the fun stuff I found to do, but we stuck to the seven missions) :)

Each mission was preceded by watching a clip from the movies. I created a DVD that had an intro highlighting a skill an archaeologist must have followed by the clip followed by their Mission Assignment. The kids LOVED this :)

#1: An archaeologist must know where he's going

Clip - the scene when Indy is flying and it shows the plane flying with the red line traveling along the map

Mission - Discover where Indy is going

I did have a very nice world map but I put it someplace safe, so had to make this one at the last minute :D

I found an image of an old plane, printed it out, glued it onto some cereal box cardboard to make it stronger, and these were our Pin the Plane on the Map markers.

The kids had to get it closest to the big red X over Egypt that marked where Indy was going to find the treasure.

#2: An archaeologist must be quick on his feet

Clip - The famous scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark with Indy replacing the golden idol and then running from the boulder.

Mission - Grab the idol before the boulder gets you!

This was our idol (thanks to Target's Halloween decorations and a cheap bottle of gold spray paint) :D

We placed this on the stairs and the kids had to replace it with a bag of rice before the "boulder" (my exercise ball, manned by my husband) bounced down the stairs and hit them. The kids had a blast with this one - I think some of them purposely went slow to get hit lol

#3: An archaeologist has to be handy with a bullwhip

Clip - I found a great montage on youtube of a ton of Indy with his whip scenes set to the song "Whip It". 

Mission - Take down the bad guys with your bullwhip!

So, I found out how to make bullwhips out of duct tape and they are AWESOME. However....I decided a bunch of 10 year olds hopped up on sugar running around with working whips might not be a good thing :) So, we used the one my son got for his Halloween costume and they took turns.

I lined up some action figures on a table outside and they had 10 seconds to knock them all down. They did surprisingly well!

#4: An archaeologist has to learn to use the weapons of the natives to defend himself

Clip -  Natives shooting at Indy with blow darts

Mission - Perfect your blow dart aim!

We gave the kids blow darts (big straws) and had them shoot spit wads at a target outside :D Tons of fun!

(I don't have a picture of this one, but I'm checking with the moms who were there and will update if anyone has one)

#5: An archaeologist should know how to fly (and land) a plane

Clip - Indy and his dad in the plane when his dad shoots out their tail end

Mission - Get your plane on the landing strip without crashing!

I made a simple "landing strip" out of cardboard and duct tape and found these great foam planes at the dollar store (each child got to keep their plane). Whoever made it closest to the X won :)

The kids were thirsty at this point so they came in and got a drink. I'd planned on doing the "you've been poisoned" bit and having them search through balloons to find the antidote but cut due to time. We did a modified version later on though :)

#6: To find the clues, an archaeologist must conquer his fears!

Clip - Indy with the snake in the plane and again finding the Well of Souls and seeing the snakes. We had the scene from Temple of Doom with all the bugs but decided to cut it due to time. We actually ended up cutting this entire game because the treasure was found a little early lol
Mission - Get past the creepy crawlies to find your clues!

#7 (we ended up skipping 6 and going to half way through 7): An archaeologist needs to know how to read a map

Clip - Indy in the map room with the Staff that showed where the ark was buried

Mission - Assemble your map to find your treasure!

We had planned on having them search through some slimy stuff (spaghetti and fake bugs and snakes) to find pieces of a map that they'd have to piece together to find the treasure, but as the treasure was spied a bit early, we skipped this.

The blog we found these ideas on built a model of their house out of Legos and rigged up a laser pointer staff that shown into the room where the treasure was hidden. I really wanted to do this but ran out of prep time.

So, I showed them a clip of what they were looking for - the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark when the open the ark (minus the sort of gory parts, just the shots of the arc) and then sent them into the yard to get it (they'd already found it earlier).

This was their treasure:

It was much more gold-looking in the sunlight. Just a cardboard box with vague angel shapes and paper towel rolls for the  handles spray painted gold and packed with candy :)

Then they came back for a final clip:

Message - Well done archaeologists! You've found your treasure! You must be hungry! An archaeologist has to eat strange foods when he is in other countries.

Clip - the "snake surprise" scene from Temple of Doom

Followed by the message - Enjoy Your Treat!!
But wait!! (Clip - Indy being told by Lao Che that he'd been poisoned, and he holds up the blue antidote) You've been poisoned! Quick, find the antidote!!

They all ran to the kitchen and grabbed their antidote bottles and had some cake :)

(Food table)

The Cake:

I found this AMAZING cake online HERE. Mine didn't turn out as well, but it was pretty dang cool :) The boys loved it. And, following the Snake Surprise clip, I hid a few gummy snakes and spiders inside the cake :D

Each boy went home with his satchel, hat, a ton of pinata candy, his plane, and a goody bag with gummy mummies, gummy spiders, eyeball gumballs, gold chocolate coins, plastic snakes, spiders, and scorpions, and a glow in the dark "crystal" skull. (All purchased very cheaply - definite perks to having a party like this around Halloween time) :)

The party was a blast! I just wish I'd been able to snap more pics :)