Thursday, March 10, 2011

Making a Spiderman Party SPECTACULAR

Lest you think this is one of those high-budget, grandeous party how-tos, where I hire a real Spiderman to come visit our party who comes carrying a three-tiered birthday cake with a Spiderman action scene taking place atop the cake, this is NOT THAT KIND OF POST! This is a little recap of the Spectacular and Not-so-Spectacular parts of our Spiderman Party!

1.) Spectacular: Decorating Yaks' doorway the night before with a crepe paper Spiderweb, complete with a Spiderman in the middle, saying, "Happy Birthday, Yaks!"
Not-so-Spectacular: Spending the entire day trying to keep Diddles from destroying it.



2.) Spectacular: Taking the yearly "I am ___ today!" pictures on an uncluttered couch with hair combed, handsome clothes that match.
3.) Spectacular: Delivered gift from Nana & Papa - perfect timing!



4.) Spectacular: Birthday Boy Special Request Dinner of salmon, Top Ramen, rolls, "and carrots for the venchtable."

Not-so-spectacular: Cleaning up Diddles' tray afterwards.



5.) Spectacular- party games: a.) Pin the Spiderman on the Web

I blind-folded Boo, spun her around and sent her walking toward the web. She got to the window, then quickly lifted her arm six inches - amazingly sticking her Spiderman right in the middle of the web! It must have been her amazing "Spidey-sense".

b.) Web-Slinging Bad Guys - thanks to the sticky-hands I found in the gumball machines for $.50 each.

They had a lot of fun with those sticky-hands!


Spectacular - This t-shirt pictured (his uniform). Yaks loves it, and would wear it every day if I let him. He changed into it minutes after I took his handsome pictures. Not-so-Spectacular - I didn't realize how DIRTY it was! Well, I guess on your birthday you get to wear the shirt you love, even if it's dirty...

c.) Spidey-Webs - Four cans of Silly String = four minutes of Spectacular chaos and fun (mess)!

Not-so-Spectacular - The cleanup, which lasted 10 minutes!
5.) A not-so-spectacular cake, which I outsourced to the store bakery, because decorating with black and red and blue frostings seemed beyond my ability. Turns out, I probably could have done a more spectacular job. Oh well, the kids LOVED it.
6.) Not-so-Spectacular - Yaks got so excited and blew out the candles just as we STARTED the birthday song.
Spectacular - Attempt #2, complete with directions from the bossy sister to wait until AFTER we sing.
Not-so-Spectacular - Grab a chair next year for the boy, and get him off the table, will ya?!


7.) Spectacular - Phone calls from Grandma/Grandpa, uncles, aunts, and Skyping with Nana/Papa.

8.) Not-so-Spectacular - Big sister's seemingly incurable case of Birthday Envy. All afternoon hearing, "Nothing is special for ME!" "Can I choose the first piece of cake?" "It's so long until my birthday!"


She totally wanted to open every present for him.

9.) Spectacular - This boy.

6 comments:

Trish and Matt said...

Ignore that last post -- didn't realize I was signed in as Matt.

Spectacular day for a spectacular kid! Thanks for sharing.

Marie' said...

Oh, I love his handsome smile! And fish and noodles... my kind of dinner. Happy birthday to Ben!

Cara and Steve said...

Happy Birthday Yaks!!! Looks like it was an awesome Spiderman party! It was fun to see you for 2 seconds on Skype tonight! Love the "I am 5 today" picture... very handsome :)

Dianna said...

This is the perfect example of the perfect blog post. You just know how to do it, Amy. My favorite parts are the not-so-spectacular parts - so funny. I love how you go to that much work and trouble for a party with just the fam.

Sarah said...

Fun day!

...noticed the "spectacular" heart wreath in the background :)

Plowgian Page said...

Happy Belated Birthday to Yaks. Love the spider web. And I thought paper snowflakes were difficult sometimes--I can't imagine. Amy, you are TOO NICE to let your family do silly string in the house!