The birthday party that (almost) wasn't.

by Holly

Our sweet Middle Man has his birthday smack dab in the middle of summer.  Bummer!

Most kids are away on vacation, or are out of contact from the school year.  But this year, I planned ahead.  I was good about sending out the invitations early and even hand delivered a couple of them to make sure some of his school buddies could be there.

And then the unexpected happened.  Strep throat.  NOOOOOOOO!!!

And poor Middle Man was stuck at his grandparents house, feeling lousy, the day before we were supposed to have the party.

My husband and I picked him up and then I spent the rest of the afternoon with him at Urgent Care.

I was NOT expecting this.  This really threw a wrench into our plans, and poor Middle Man had to be told that his party would have to be another day.  (And also told that he would have to have a big shot in his bum since we wouldn't be home to give him penicillin 3 times a day for the next 10 days)  Not a good day for the little guy, or his sad momma.

But the party must go on, and my whole family had come to town to celebrate the big "6."  So we changed it from Sunday to Thursday (my family had to go home on Friday).

And even though the party ended up being much smaller than we had planned, we partied on and gave Middle Man the best party ever!

We did a Cape Cod style water party.  I have seen a lot of nautical themed little boy parties lately, but I wanted to grow it up a bit (after all he is 6!), so it was all about water games, lighthouses, and sail boats.  This ring greeted guests at the front door.  I made it with styrofoam and white and red yarn.  So simple!  I decided on the color scheme thanks to Target and all their great turquoise and red party goodies they came out with this season.

The party was mostly in the backyard, where we had the amazing kid wash.  I found this bag at Barnes and Noble, of all places, and used it to store extra towels for anyone who needed them.

This is the kid wash.  I saw it in Family Fun Magazine and just knew it had to be the center of the party.  My husband and dad put it together in about an hour and for around $30!!!  Turn on the hose, and it is instant water fun. The kids had a great time cooling off.  I have more pics of the kids running through it, but I'm saving them for Thursday (hehe).

We used our dining room table as the buffet for the food.  I found a cheap galvanized lantern at our local feed store and got some sea stars with a coupon from Michael's.

I took some old tin cans and wrapped them with twine and then made a paper label on turquoise ribbon for the utensils.  I had this red tin that I added some lighthouse stickers to in order to dress it up a bit for the plates and napkins.

A fun project the kids helped me with was painting these $1 lighthouses from Michael's for the food cards.  Will's favorite food is chicken nuggets, so they had to be on the menu, along with sub sandwiches for the adults, fruit salad, and this yummy pasta salad...

They called it "pool noodle salad" in Family Fun magazine.  It was super easy to make.  It's just penne noodles, cucumbers with the middle cut out, and watermelon balls (yes, watermelon).  You toss it with olive oil, mint, and feta.  Delicious!!!  And we topped it all off with yummy lemonade.

On Thursday I will share with you some of the activities we did and the fabulous dessert bar.  You can laugh at me and the amount of desserts there were for about 10 guests... Just remember, originally there were supposed to be over 30, so I am justified.  (Even though we are STILL eating leftover oreo pops.  Not necessarily a bad thing.)

It really was a great party, and the important thing was that the birthday boy had a lot of fun and felt celebrated.  Stay tuned for more to come...

Happy Tuesday!