I was working on another theme for Noah this year, but then I saw an ad for End Zone stating that they did birthday parties, so I had to go check it out. I had never even been in the store before, but what a surprise! It's pure male paradise. Plus I loved it because I love playing board games, and they have every game you've ever heard of, and every one you haven't.
When I saw the video game party room, I knew this was the place for Noah's party. All of his friends are as big of fans of video games as Noah, so it was sure to please. And I thought the cost was very reasonable for 3 hours of fun, and not having to put 12 boys in my house!
INVITATIONS:
I'm really proud of these because I think they turned out so cute! I did a Google search for Lego Star Wars and found this cute picture in high quality. It had the "Lego Star Wars The Video Game" on it so I simply added "Birthday Party!" underneath that in Photoshop Elements. Then I typed the lower text, skewed it, added the yellow border, and sized it to print out as a 4"x6" photo. Then I just uploaded them, and picked up my prints a few hours later. I got help on the wording from some of the ideas on Birthday Party Ideas.
Back:I did the backs in Microsoft Publisher, printed them out, cut them to the same size as the photos, and glued them together. I added a business card from End Zone at the bottom.
ACTIVITIES:VIDEO GAMES! 6 big screen TV's, 3 with Lego Star Wars (my personal favorite), 1 with Lego Batman, 1 with Lego Indiana Jones, and 1 with another game on it (don't remember what it was) that had a bunch of mini-games.
The kids were SO excited to get into the room and start playing. I tried to make sure they got a chance to switch games if they wanted to, and tried to have Noah play with all of his guests at some point during the party. I used my 14 year-old son Logan as a fill-in when someone needed a partner to play with or help on a game. The owner's son was also in there to make sure everything was working right and to help the kids if they got stuck on part of a level.
FOOD:Pizza, and green Gatorade bottles that we called "Yoda Soda". Then we had cupcakes and ice cream cups. I have never seen kids eat so fast in my life! As soon as they were done and washed their hands they could head back in to play again.
It was a fun setting to eat in the Lego room of the store. The boys had a good time pointing out to each other what sets they owned.
I brought the blue and green table cloths to put over theirs, so all we had to do was pile up the pizza boxes, gather the table cloths up with everything in them, and shove them in a garbage bag, and we were good to go.
FAVORS:
Because of the cost of this party, I didn't do a whole lot for the treat bags. I made the little topper for the baggies and put in colorful Twizzlers (I thought they looked like light sabers) and Starburst candies.
CAKE:On Noah's actual birthday, I made this sad looking Lego cake. I used cupcakes on the top, and it would have been easier if I could have frozen them first, decorated them off the cake, then placed them on. I think using Ding Dongs instead might have worked better also. But, I was in a hurry, and Noah liked it, so, oh well. (And thanks to Photoshop it looks much better than it did in real life ;0)
It was a very fun party, and you can't beat not having to clean up anything. But my only problem may be that he will want to go there every year from now on, and I just don't think I could handle repeating a theme - what would I blog?
