Arrrrrrrrrr! It's a Pirate Party for Captain Andrew.

Andrew had many different ideas of what kind of a birthday party he wanted to have, but he finally settled on a Pirate Party.  Many of you know that we like to make our kid's birthdays a big deal rather than other holidays, such as Christmas.  Well Nicole did not disappoint.  She went all out for Andrew's Pirate Party from the invitations to the games to the cake and everything in between.  Most of my time preparing for the party was spent clearing our back yard of weeds.  I also helped in making some of Nicole's brilliant ideas become a reality.  We told Andrew that he could invite ten of his friends to his party.  The invitations were a message in a bottle with sand and sea-shells.

Nicole bought plates, cups, napkins, etc. and lots of fun pirate stuff for the goody bags.  She found some really cool stuff at the Oriental Trading Company: swords, bandanas, rings, suckers, etc. She made goody bags for all of Andrew's friends and put them in a treasure chest (a styrofoam cooler spray-painted gold).  Andrew had swimming lessons in the morning, so we went and did that and then came home to get things ready for the party.

Andrew turned out to be a great lookin pirate.  He wanted so badly to have a parot for his shoulder, so Nicole found this printable Scully and we pinned him to Andrew's shirt.  He loved it!  He got dressed and walked around saying, "Arrrrrr matey."

 Rory made an adorable bucaneer as well.

Nicole had it all set up that when the kids arrived they were transformed into pirates.  She had bandanas and eye patches, and bracelets for the girls.  She even found this page online that helped the kids to pick out their pirate names, such as "Captain Andrew the Handsome."  When Drew arrived, Nicole tried to help him pick a pirate name, but he said, "I'm Blackbeard, I'm Blackbeard, I'm Blackbeard."  Apparently he wanted to be Blackbeard.

Nicole also got this cute foam ship for decoration.  It was the hardest thing we had to make for the party--go figure.  We had also gotten these balloons for Andrew yesterday to have when he woke up on his birthday, then they became decoration.

As for the games that we had for the kids to play, we had "Walk the Plank," "Bombs Away," and "Treasure Hunt."

We had a cooler and a bucket that were the same height, but Nicole thought that would look ghetto, so she turned the bucket into a barrel (of rum? Probably not.) and the cooler into a boulder.  We also had a shark and an alligator in the water waiting for an unsuspecting pirate to fall off the plank.

Nicole and I made these pirate ships for the kids to play "Bombs Away." The kids arms were cannons and they were shooting water balloon canon balls.

 

 I forgot to take a picture of the treasure chest before we hid it for the treasure hunt, but it looked pretty good for a makeshift treasure chest.

Nicole found a woman in our ward that makes cakes, so she told and showed her what she was thinking and Megan did a great job of putting it together.  Andrew's only demand was that it had a parrot--isn't that a cute parrot.  Andrew loved it! (Even when he popped it into his mouth.) And it tasted so yummy too!

The kids began to arrive at 1pm and they became pirates.

Now the plan was to have the kids arrive and get dressed up, and then start playing games.  That was not going to happen as soon as some of the boys saw the stuff outside, they were ready to go.  As more kids arrived, they took turns walking the plank.

 When everyone but a couple of kids had arrived we got ready for "Bombs Away." It was a lot of fun! And there was even a "Hose Hurricane" when the water balloons ran out.



The Captain went down with his ship during the "Hurricane." He stood strong and true!

The only game left to play was the "Treasure Hunt," which was going to be after cake and ice cream, but we were going a little faster than we planned so we let the kids have a little fun--or a lot of fun getting wet and muddy! (Not my idea; everyone was very muddy and wet and we had only told parents they might get wet.-Nicole)

 We decided to let the kids dry off a little while eating cake, so we brought the cake outside while singing Happy Birthday.

 After we all had our fill of cake and ice cream, it was time for the treasure hunt.  Each of the kids got a pirate sword to start the hunt.  I had made clues to lead us to the treasure chest.  They were quite clever if I do say so myself.  And giving credit where it is due, Nicole helped with the first clue.  The kids got very excited each time one of them found the hidden clue--and of course when they found the treasure chest. 

After all of Andrew's friends got their stuff, it was Andrew's turn to open presents.  I must say he has some very sweet and thoughtful friends.  All of the gifts were something Andrew was very excited about.  And the kids were so excited for him to open their present to him.  A couple of the girls even drew birthday cards for him.  It was very cool!

 After that we still had some time, so we let the kids play sword fights.  Some of the kids really got into it.  Some of them, not so much.  We had to put a stop to that when Paige H. face plated into the tile and got a bloody lip.  Then it was up to me to come up with some Pirate games on the fly.  So we played "Jack, Jack, Sparrow" (Duck, Duck, Goose), "Captain Blackbeard Says" (Simon Says), "Stormy Seas" (we all held hands in a circle and I started the storm by making waves with my arms until it moved through the whole circle and we all ended up on the floor), and a couple of interesting games that Andrew came up with including "Exploding Bombs" (we all had to explode as loud as we could and fall down). 

Then parents came and picked up their pirates and that was it.  We did end up losing one of the boys flip flops which we later found completely buried in the mud by the pool (had to dig them out with a garden claw).  All in all everyone had fun, Andrew got spoiled for his birthday, and it was a great success! So all that's left to say is...

AVAST ME HARTEYS...YE ALL BE FINE BUCANEERS!!!