Quinn's Army Party

We'll I am feeling rather shattered right now - hosting a party for 5-8 year olds will do that to you!

Let's see, we had no idea what to do this year, and I wasn't even sure if I was going to do a party, or when. Part of me wanted to keep it simple and just have 5 or 10 kids and go do a simple contained activity, like Ice Skating or Laser Quest or something. In the end we found some cool army party gear and decided an army party it had to be.

The cake

The result has been spending weeks scouring shops for Army related clothing, toys, balloons, guns and caps. Surfing the internet for downloadables and game ideas, making dog tags, certificates, potato hand-grenades (explained later), signage, party packs, prizes, planning activities etc etc. Not to mention staying up till 12am last night, after going out for dinner, making the cake. *yawn*

Unfortunately, even though school is only days away, many people have stretched their holiday trips right to the very end, and so we not available. Pity. Still we had 12 kids in the end, and that worked well.

Quinn has nagged me for guns for years, and I always tell him I don't do guns. Well I decided to make an exception and let him have cap guns at the party. You know those ones with the round red cap cartridges or the cap paper ribbons? Did you know that the action of squeezing the hands like firing a gun or squeezing a Windowlene bottle strengthens the hands and helps for writing?

(By the way our OT (Occupational Therapist) recommended this for Griffin, and let's face it boys would rather fire guns than wash windows. Hell so would I!!!).

So, Richard told me JUST after I finished inviting everyone (hrm) that he was leaving for week long trip to Australia today, to attend LCA. Gee thanks! After threatening him with death, I revised my penalty saying he could get respite as long as he helps with the party preparations - and admittedly he did - and I only had to nag and tantrum a few dozen times! ;)

So, after a relatively early start this morning, especially considering my late night last night, and quick run, I had to gallop around to make sure I had everything sorted for the party, and pack the Hyundai, then dash off to take Richard to the airport, and then rush back via hi-fi corporation to get the cardboard for the forts, which Richard was meant to build *mutter* *mutter*. We then zoomed home to swap cars, cram the cardboard and cooler boxes in, realize there was no space for the kids, so pile them on top of each other & then head off to get the party set up.

We had to stop en route to buy ice, and then make another 4 stops to put up signs and direction markers and balloons to guide the party guests to the venue. We finally arrived at the venue which was half-way along the Alphen Trail green belt. A lovely setting with grass, trees, a stream, and logs etc. I set everything up and was just getting to turning to boxes into camo forts when the guests started arriving.

Once everyone arrived each 'recruit' was issued with their dog-tags, and party pack. Then it was time to start the games. I gave each child a piece of paper, and they had to make paper jets. We then had a competition to see whose jet could fly the furthest, and which jet could land closest to a target. The winning person for each category won a prize.

Then we had arm wrestling competitions. They were very keen on this, and there was much challenging going on. Finally Mathieu and Thulani were declared joint champions and won prizes.

We took a break from the competitive games and I haded out the cap guns and caps, and the kids roared around shooting off the caps and started playing in the forts and round the streams, trees and bushes. They really had fun doing this.

Then it was time for 'dispose of the hand-grenade', which was basically a potato and spoon race, with the potatoes decorated as hand grenades.

The most fun games was 'Rescue the Wounded Soldiers' I split the kids into two groups, and they chose one person to be their injured soldier. I gave the wounded soldier painted wounded on their arms and legs and took them to the other side of the field and got them to lie down. At the sound of the whistle the rest of the group had to run to their wounded soldier and 'dress' their injuries with 'bandages' (toilet paper) until they were no longer visible. They then had to place their wounded soldire on a 'stretcher' (towel) and carry them back to the start. The winners would be the team returning with a properly bandaged soldier and who was not crying from being dropped or man handled. ;) The kids really got into this race and there was much yelling and excited co-operation to work together to get it done quickly. The competition was strong.

After the competitive games ended, we brought out the water balloons. We had about 150! I took them to the far side of the stream with the forts and the kids went wild, plowing through all the balloons in several minutes, as the saying goes you can never have too many water balloons.

After some more free play, it was time to do the cake. Most kids had been too busy playing to eat much at all, so it was nice that for a change the cake was a huge hit with kids asking for big pieces and even coming back for seconds. (So often you end up stuck with more than half a cake, and who wants to eat green and blue cake after 2 days!?). We only took a tiny piece home.

I forgot to play 'Sargeant Says' which was meant to be a variation on Simon Says, and I also forgot to hand out the certificates to the competition winners. D'oh. However I think the party went great. It would definitely have helped having Richard there to help with hosting and making sure everyone had enough to drink and eat, but hopefully everyone did.

I am also very irked that my camera batteries refuse to charge properly anymore, so despite taking **3** sets of batteries with me, I still ended up with flat batteries and missed most of the party, and some of the best photo ops. *SULK* What I did manage to get is on flickr.