Bode's 6th Birthday Blowout!

Bode's birthday party happened this past Saturday. True to form, even though Doug and I had 3 weeks to prepare, we were scrambling to get things ready the day and night before. I need that looming deadline to get anything done. But it came together and was a really great time. We had 15 kids (including our own), 3 adults, 4 activities, and a lot of fun. We divided the kids into 2 groups and had games upstairs and an obstacle course in the basement. Here's a glimpse...

Doug dubbed these "bat-a-rangs" (like boomerangs) and were used in the obstacle course

Each child was armed with a marshmallow shooter

We had a pre-game team meeting to explain the game plan, what things were and what you were NOT to do with them (i.e. no throwing bat-a-rangs at people, we do not shoot marshallows at eyeballs; etc.)

I think they were taking things seriously...

Pre-obstacle course target practice

I think he was having a good time (laughing as someone walked into the wall while blindfolded for "Pin the "S" on the Superman")

This game was dropping "kryptonite" back into the Planet Krypton (the foil covered pretzel barrel). It was kind of a flop, and they enjoyed pelting me with kryptonite instead...

More target practice

Obstacle Course Challenge 1:
Find your ammo (mini-marshmallows in a snack bag) somewhere in the balloon-filled bouncy castle

Obstacle Course Challenge 2: Find your weapon (marshmallow shooter) in the maze

Obstacle Course Challenge 3: Speed away to save the day in one of the Batmobiles

O.C. Challenge 4: No pictures, but they had to use their shooters to knock down a foam block castle.
O.C. Challenge 5: Using their Superhero lung capacity to get the ball up the ramp.
The final O.C. challenge was working together to get their bat-a-rangs off the top of the punching bag (using pure brute strength). The bat-a-rangs fell off the bag and into their hot little hands.

Check out the kid on the far right. I laughed hard when i saw that one!

Yahoo! A bazooka!! (rocket launcher? some sort of anti-aircraft missile?)

Batman (iron-on) t-shirts to take home

And now? i need a nap.