This blog started as a school assignment but since I am a gamer mom 4 life :) I decided to continue my adventures through the perils and peculiarities of raising kids as second generation gamers. We had two video game theme birthdays this year, Minecraft and Super Mario. Ironically, Super Mario was the theme for my oldest, although I myself consider Mario to have a timeless, universal appeal.
Party Prep
I have really taken an interest in the kids' parties this year. From volunteering as class mom for my youngest, to the birthday parties and get-togethers at my house, I have nearly gone overboard. My Pinterest addiction has not helped. I started gathering ideas for the party about a month or two ahead of time. The Internet is my sole source of ideas. I start a new board right away and 'throw' ideas to the board for future reference as the party gets closer. I also create a specific folder on my desktop for downloading free files or inspirational images I encounter, as the longer I am doing this, the less free printables I am finding. I am very appreciative of those authors that do provide free information and I will try to include all the links here for others who are interested. Here is my Pinterest board for the party:
http://pinterest.com/kellokittymommy/nintendoland-party/
Goodie/Favor Bags
The goodie boxes are usually the easiest thing to figure out and complete. These are red take out boxes from Walmart at .47 apiece. Another mom who was working on a different party had some of these leftover that she couldn't use so she gave them to me to use for this party. I got Mario theme stickers at Party City as well as themed favors - pencils (6 pk $1) - erasers (4pk $1) - pencil sharpeners - stickers - Mario gummies (grocery store 12 pk $2) - vanilla candy Wii remotes. I set the boxes in a clear favor bag and tied with red curling ribbon.
The Wii remotes were a fun project. I bought the candy mold from Amazon.
http://www.amazon.com/CK-Products-Video-Controller-Chocolate/dp/B003QP33Q4 and used Wilton vanilla wafers to fill the molds. After the candy cooled, I used a food dye pen from Hobby Lobby to write the details on the remote fashioned after a real remote. I put the remotes in individual pretzel rod bags before putting them in the box with the rest of the favors.
Party Games
The party games were an evolving set of ideas that came from reading blogs, Pinterest and trial and error. The first 'game' I knew I wanted for sure was to create a Question Block pinata. I initially thought I would build my own pinata, as I had found a lot of DIY sites and it seemed like a craft I could handle. After further research, and most of the pinatas used a round balloon as a base which wouldn't work for me, I just kept my eyes out whenever I headed to the store for something. One day at Target, I found a Square/Rectangular Present Pinata which I envisioned working perfectly for my Question Block. ($14)
I bought gold tissue paper and spray adhesive. I copied an image of the question block which I modified for the right size and printed on card stock. A couple of layers of tissue paper with the spray adhesive, the cutout question mark and plain dot (price tag) stickers completed the pinata just the way I wanted.
The final idea came to me in the next to last week of party planning, which was to tie all the games together by recreating a Mario Party and having the kids try to find the most stars, like in a real Mario Party game. This evolved from the original idea of the party, which was to make it a Nintendo Land party, based off a Wii U game we just got at the time. I ditched the Nintendo Land party idea a couple weeks into planning, realizing that there were too many characters and too many possibilities.
The star idea worked really well. I made a dozen or so stars out of Sculpey clay with a star cookie cutter and colored the eyes with black Sharpie. I made another dozen or so stars out of yellow foam (actually my husband made these - I couldn't figure out how to cut them out and he gives me a hand with all the crafts I can't figure out like that - I believe he punched them out with the cookie cutter and a mallet in the garage). I also drew stars on candy to emulate the Candy in Mario Party and as 'bonus' stars for the end of the game.
The Sculpey stars (after baked) were designed to go inside the Yoshi Egg Smash game and the Pinata. The foam stars were designed to go inside the Cheep Cheep and Blooper Burst game (water balloons).
Cheep Cheep Surprise Game
Orange water balloons were filled slightly and several of them had foam 'stars' pushed inside. I used sharpie to make the Cheep Cheep face based on an image I pulled up on the Internet. My husband came up with the fin idea and he hand cut all of them and super glued them on, one of the many, many reasons I love him so much. The water balloons were placed in the pool at the bottom of our inflatable water slide and on "GO" the kids had to race into the water to pop the balloons and find as many stars as possible to hold on to for the counting at the end of the party.
Note: We live in FL and the water balloons sat in the water in the sun for less than a half hour and over half of them popped on their own...despite the original water balloon prototype sat in my house for over a week without any problems, so I would keep them out of the sun as much as possible.
Blooper Burst Game
This was probably, by far, the kids' favorite game. It certainly took some inventing and trial and error on my part to create. I started with plain white favor bags from the craft store and I wanted to make a game that would let the kids try to burst a balloon inside that would either have 'ink' or a star... The first blooper I cut out started with the bottom opening as the tentacles and the top as the head. The second one was reversed and with some creative cutting I came up with a process that worked much better. The eyes were quite easy to make with Sharpie. I used black balloons so the kids couldn't try to guess which one had a star by looking underneath the bags. I filled each balloon with a small amount of water and half with foam stars and the other half with a tablespoon or so of washable black tempera paint. I used staples at the bottom of the bag to create the head shape and placed the balloon inside the bag. I tied jute to the top of the balloon and my husband created a jute line strung between two trees in the backyard which we hung each individual Blooper from. I had the kids stand in a line and numbered the Bloopers then walked kids up individually to 'pop' the bloopers from the underside with a toothpick I gave them. The kids loved the anticipation if they were going to get 'inked' or get a star. A lot of work went into this game, so I only made one blooper per kid at the party.
Yoshi Egg Smash
This was the easiest game to make and set up. I got the idea off another blog I saw on the Internet. I bought plain white Easter eggs on clearance at Walmart right after Easter. I used Sharpie to draw circles on the eggs after looking at Yoshi Egg pics on the web. I filled each egg with plastic gold coins from the dollar store and a spiral paper streamer (they come in a multi pack at the party store all connected, had to tear them apart). I filled half of the eggs with a star or two. I put an old sheet on the lawn up against a spot on our white vinyl fence. The kids took turns picking an egg out of the basket and hurling it at the fence so it would burst open upon impact revealing the streamer, coins and if they were lucky, a star.
Fire and Ice
No stars, just plain old red and blue water balloons with some imagination turned into Mario Fire and Ice balls. I got the images for the sign off the Internet and I couldn't figure out how to use Word to simply 'flip' the Mario so he appears upside down. I asked my son for approval and he thought it was cool so I didn't bother researching to figure out how to fix it.
Party Craft
I only did one party craft with the kids. I wanted them to have fun in the sun and water with the games that were set up. I bought small drawstring tulle type pouches at the dollar store (6pk for $1) which were actually baby shower party bags. These were for the kids to hold their stars they collected throughout the party. To customize each individual bag, I had the kids email or let their parents tell me the character they wanted ahead of time from a list of characters from Mario Party (Mario, Yoshi, Luigi, etc). I had printed small versions of these characters on card stock, cut them out and taped them to #5 Plastic. I used the lid from a Bake and Take container at the grocery store. The kids used sharpies to outline and color the characters, baked in an oven to make 'Shrinky Dinks' then attached a keychain and clip to identify their bags with their names on the keychains.
Food and Decorations
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| Cake Inspiration - Mario Party 9 Toad Road Game Board |
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| Cake in Progress - 'backboard' three printed images |
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| Finished Cake |
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| Watermelon and String Cheese |
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| Sharpie + white balloon and Walmart star decorations |
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| Printed signs from blog. Green spray painted PVC from Lowe's for Foam ball and Sculpey Piranha Plant |
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| Marshmallow pops - much easier than cake pops |
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| Favor table |
Party Prizes
I don't have a picture of these. They were the leftover white favor bags for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place. I couldn't find Mario themed 1st, 2nd and 3rd images so I just used generic image from the web and printed out to cardstock. The bag had extra stickers and a bagged Knex mario figure ($2.50 each) I stapled the bag, glued first second or third label to the outside and attached plastic trophy (4pk $1) with string/hole punch.
The final game was my favorite -I held onto some bonus stars and gave each kid a plastic grocery bag. They had to go around the yard and pick up as many pieces of broken water balloons, plastic eggs, and any other paper trash they could find. The kids lined up when they picked up as much trash as they could and I counted each piece of trash in each kids bag. The kids with the most trash got bonus stars - and my yard was clean!
Thanks to all the Moms who post all their brilliant ideas on the web so I can be inspired to create on my own or when I can't to copy your ideas! I hope some of my ideas give you inspiration for your own parties!
