Wednesday, May 27, 2009

The belated birthday party post

Max's birthday was a month ago and I finally got the pictures in the computer. (thanks CJ)

We invited 5 three and four year old kids to the party. Remembering the fiasco that was Brielle's first "friends" party when she turned three (yes, I know.........A BIRTHDAY PARTY WITH A BUNCH OF THREE YEAR OLDS...... WHAT WAS I THINKING???) We scheduled the party for ONE hour.
I wanted to have a "Pirate" party. Seriously, how much fun that could have been? We could have got pirate eye patches for all the kids, had a treasure hunt, a treasure chest cake and pinata, played "walk the plank"...........

Max did not want a pirate party. He wanted a garbage truck party.

Do you have any idea how hard it is to find garbage truck party stuff?

I went to the dollar store to buy invitations for the party, and the only boy type of birthday invitations that they had were some with a pirate theme.
I took that to be a sign.
I bought the invitations and some party favors and came home to show them to Max.

Me: "Hey Max, look at the invitations I got for your party, aren't they cool?"
Max: "Yes!"
Me: "See, now we can have a pirate party!"
Max: "I not did want a pirate party, I want a GARBAGE TRUCK party!"

I still sent out the pirate invitations, because I HAD spent a whole dollar on them and was still holding out hope that he would change his mind.
Naturally, Max did not change his mind, so we went ahead and planned the garbage truck party. We decorated the house with green and yellow balloons and streamers.

On the day of the party, at the appointed time, 5 cute little kids arrived at our house. (after Brielle's party the night before, this one would be a piece of cake)

When they first came, we had some crafts for them to do. I bought some plain party hats and some animal stickers, and let them decorate their own hats. This was great fun for the kids, and Max covered his hat with bird stickers.
Next, we had some pages for them to color. Brielle went to PBS.org and printed some Oscar the Grouch coloring pages. The only one available had a big number "4" on it, which was perfect, because it was Max's fourth birthday!

The first game we played was "Pin the garbage can on the garbage truck"


The next game we played was a version of duck, duck, goose which we changed to be "garbage, garbage, recycle"

The next activity we had planned was a pinata.

Just try to find a garbage truck pinata. I dare you.

At first, I planned to make a ghetto pinata, but instead we decided on a different way to get the big bag of candy to the kids.

I had bought the big Costco bag of candy (planning on having some left over) We dumped some of the candy on the living room floor, covered it in a big pile of torn up newspaper and told the kids to dig through the garbage to find the candy.

We called this game "dumpster diving"




The kids had a blast digging through the paper to find the candy. I went into the kitchen to get the cake ready, and it seemed like it was taking a long time for the kids to get the candy. I later found out that Aaron had continued to dump candy in the pile of newspaper until we had gone through the entire 10 pound bag of candy.

That's right folks, a 10 lb bag of candy divided between 6 kids. I'm pretty sure there were a few moms that weren't too happy with me that day.

When they had stuffed their goodie bags full of candy, Max opened his presents, then the kids came into the kitchen for cake.

A garbage truck cake.



I will say that it was quite delicious!

At that point, the hour was up, and the moms started arriving to pick up their children.
And Max said that it was a "reeeaolly fun birthday party" then he spent the remainder of the day playing with his new toys.

I sliced myself another chunk of garbage truck cake and sat on the couch with my feet up, happy to have the parties over.

Except they weren't over. We were having one more party (I know you are wondering "how much more can this poor woman take??")
The next day we were having a family birthday party for both Max and Brielle.

And Grandma was bringing the cake :0)




A pink elephant, you don't get any cuter than that.


As we were growing up, my mom would make these fabulous cut up cakes every year for our birthdays and also for all of our cousins and now she makes them for her grandchildren.

25 comments:

Kristina P. said...

OK, I love you even more now. Of COURSE Max would ask for a garbage truck party. Haha!

rychelle said...

i REALLY want some cake now.

Jana Nielson said...

I am totally stealing this idea for my baby's 3rd birthday!! He is obsessed with Garbage trucks. We have a sanitation worker that has a long white beard, and Danny thinks he is Santa. He is convinced that Santa drives a garbage truck.
Every tuesday (garbage day) Dan is at the window, waiting for Santa to come.
He even has a garbage truck that he rides around on saying, "Ho Ho Ho! Merry tismas!"
I am glad that we are kindred spirits in the world of garbage!

wv: hyper

Jillene said...

You gotta love a garbage truck party and Max!! Love the cake--I would never dare to make something like that. I would look like trash!! (0;

Karen said...

Excellent cake! And such a smart lady to have a one-hour party. That's all they really need and you're not sitting there for 3 hours with 5 out-of-control four year olds.

Jessica said...

What a great party! I am totally impressed. I love the one hour party idea. I MAY be willing to have a friend party for my almost 3yo if it's only an hour. Great games!

Suburban Correspondent said...

dumpster diving party game? You are so my type of person!

And please do tell all - how did you make the cake?

mCat said...

I wanna be in the car on the way home while one of those little friends describes the garbage party, the dumpster diving etc. Hysterical!

Jen said...

This is the best party post EVER! That sounds like so much fun!

Jen said...

calkab: what you do if the garbage truck driver won't give you a ride home.

Bonnie the Boss said...

You are so awesome to do all that for the party! and clever too, your hubby is one lucky guy! Loved the cake!

Amber said...

I'm SO glad you went with the garbage truck party. Dumpster diving may be my favorite birthday party game ever.

Me said...

I love the Garbage truck cake!!! Max is the cutest ever!!
P/S tell your DH I know my phone is disconected...I know he will panic when he calls me :-) All I can say is Oops :-) I have to pay them...Silly me! Love ya!

Me said...

Oh, the Me is Amanda...Above :-) I forgot I changed my profile to super private..

Jo said...

Awww, could it get anymore perfect. What an incredibly nice mom you are. Even if your kid is kind of weird, I mean, very creative!
wv:gastrizr
What Jill needed done after she ate all of Max's cake by herself.

Randi said...

"Garbage, garbage, recycle" made me spit water on my monitor.

And then dumpster diving... What a crack up.

Cris said...

Garbage truck party?! The garbage trucks at our place really stinks you can smell it from a mile away! Kids do have really crazy ideas. Cute, though.

rocslinger said...

Dumpster diving, fantastic.
I have a daughter so her parties have been the typical girly things.

When my daughter was five we invited eleven kids, thinking that only half would make it. All but one came, it was not pretty.

amelia said...

"Garbage, garbage, recycle" - I love it! And you planned an awesome party out of his random theme.

Brillig said...

HAHAHAHA! That's so awesome. Of course your kid wanted a garbage truck party! And what a trooper you are to have made that happen for him. So awesome.

david06 said...
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david06 said...

We use to do the same before when we were kids and enjoy a lot in those days and we use to have birthday remainder book and see that ever month and wish our friend a day before at mid 12.

Jessica G. said...

Awesome party idea! Does the Dumpster Diving game work for grown-up parties, too?

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