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May the Force Be With You

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It started out as a Jedi bowling birthday party and turned into a Star Wars sleepover. For my son’s 8th birthday, we had three friends meet us at the local bowling alley. We then took the boys home and gave them their Jedi costumes. After the boys finished beating the snot out of each other Jedi training, we served hamburgers, ice cream sundaes, and topped off the evening watching the original Star Wars movies.

The Invitation: These were tricky. Star Wars logos and characters are licensed, so it is almost impossible to find a tasteful blank Star Wars themed invitation. There are some out there, but they looked cheap to me and usually had the Star Wars Lego characters. I ended up buying blank cardstock and designed the invitation on my computer. I Googled the Star Jedi font and downloaded it for free. Search Google images for things like lightsaber or Darth Vader to paste into the invite. I used wording on the invitation like, “In a Galaxy Not Too Far Away” and “Journey Begins” and “Regrets to the Jedi Master.”

The Jedi Outfit: When I visited my sewing sister this summer, she set me up on her sewing machine, and I actually made the Jedi robes myself! If you can sew a straight line, you can do these. I will say you need a lot of fabric (which can be expensive), so I was glad my son wanted just 2 or 3 friends. Our local karate school gave us the white karate belts. We made the lightsabers from pool noodles. I followed directions that I found on Pinterest, which were clear and easy. My children did most of the handle work themselves. FYI– blue and green lightsabers are the good side of the Force; red is the Dark Side.

      

The Tablescape: Sewing sister came through on this one too. She forwarded a slumber party idea to me that showed how to use twin bed sheets to make your rectangular dining table look like a made up bed. I found the Star Wars sheets at Target for about $20. These are NOT Egyptian cotton, so if you choose to use them on your regular bed after the party, you may want to wear a rash guard with your pajamas. If you watch the original Star Wars movie for food scenes (there are not too many), they tend to eat out of tupperware looking things. I saw the travel coffee mugs in the $1 aisle at Target and thought they were perfect. I downloaded the napkin/light saber rings and directions from this website.

    

The Mos Eisley Sundae Bar: You find so many good things in that $1 aisle at Target. I found the silver buckets, the grey bins, and the grey bowls during a recent trip. I wanted all of the food containers to have a sort of future/space age feel to them. We set out ice cream toppings in black (Crushed Oreos and Thin Mints), brown (chocolate sprinkles), grey (M&Ms), and green (M&Ms) colors. I sort of copied the ice cream sundae bar from my niece’s birthday party.

The Mos Eisley Breakfast Bar: I went with the future/space age thing again. In the Empire Strikes Back movie where Luke eats on Dagobah and meets Yoda, he eats something that sort of looks like a dog biscuit but is probably a freeze dried jerky kind of thing. I thought granola bars and mini cereal boxes would fit in with that type of food. I also served vanilla yogurt in mini tupperwares with some fresh fruit topping choices. The yogurt was an homage to that blue/green smoothie type drink Luke poured himself while at dinner with Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru near the beginning of Star Wars. You may be wondering how I am able to recall so many details of the original Star Wars movies. I’ll just say that I am very good at Star Wars Trivial Pursuit and leave it at that.

The Party Favors: The guests took their Jedi outfits home as the party favors. They also took the travel coffee mugs too.

Party Invitation Giveaway Winner

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As suspected, the competition was fierce for the construction birthday party invitations. After carefully reviewing all of the two entries, I could not make a decision. Both entries offered some very creative ideas for activities, treats, and party favors that included setting up a construction site in a sand box and designing a play roadway with cones and yellow tape. See the original post and comments to learn more.

To pick the winner, I set up a double blind drawing with the help of my daughter (who picked the winning name out of the bowl). I know the anticipation is killing you, so congratulations to… Aunt B. It is your lucky day! I will be contacting you shortly with all of the details, and we will want pictures after you host your party. A special thank you to Phyllis (the dark horse) Ford for participating.

To everyone else, please keep reading. My daughter’s kindergarten orientation is on August 17, and if I time my arrival correctly, I should be able to make it to the parent volunteer sheet before anyone else and snag the title of Kindergarten Room Parent. Wish me luck and stay tuned for more tips and tricks to help you navigate the school year.

One Lovely Blog

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What a happy surprise!  A fellow blogger, FadedFairyTale, nominated me for a blog award.

7/30/2012 — Another nomination.  Thank you Parentista for the nomination.  I am so appreciative to have bloggers who read and like my posts. I am combining my nomination posts since I don’t have any new insights about myself to add. I did have one new hot blog to share, so I updated my blog nominations. See the list below.

There are some rules that go with the nomination:

  1. Thank the blogger who nominated you with a link to the site. (see above)
  2. Write seven things about yourself that other bloggers don’t know.
  3. Nominate fifteen other deserving blogs.

Seven things about myself:

  1. Eating Altoids makes me sneeze.
  2. I let my children watch TV, so I can read (mostly juvenile literature).
  3. I recently learned how to make pasta from scratch. And, yes, it is far superior to pasta from the box.
  4. I love spreadsheets, tables, lists, file systems, etc.
  5. My dining room table is overflowing with mail and in-progress projects. My husband wants to know why I insist on having a dining room in any house we own since we never eat at that table. DUH– where else will all my project supplies go?
  6. I love junky Mexican restaurants and margaritas (frozen, no salt).
  7. I let my children eat Fritos, crackers, whatever is in the pantry for breakfast as long as they fix it themselves.

(Almost) 15 blog nominations:

Oh Yes They Did! — Hilarious.  I always laugh when reading this and LOVE this blogger’s writing style.

Nerdy Book Club — Great source for juvenile book ideas.

Popcorntheblog — Tips and inspiration about writing.

Wuppenif — Love reading about life on a farm.

Pretty Baking — Really good cake ideas.

The Joy of Teaching — Good comments about education.

Running in Mommyland — Written by a friend from my 8th grade class about life as a mom and trying to keep up with it all.  This blog semi-inspired me to get my blog going.

Village Connection — Keeps me updated on new and fun things in my neighborhood.

Hot Mess Mom — If you feel down about your parenting skills, read this.

Paper and Cake — Party ideas and printables

I wish I had more, but I am new to the blogging world and am just beginning to explore all of the great posts that are out there. Thank you again FadedFairyTale and Parentista for the nominations.  It made my day(s)!

The Teacher and the Room Mom

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I am a 4th grade teacher, and I also try to volunteer to be the class room mom for my two children.  I am a little crafty, I like to make cupcakes, and I love projects.  As my husband will tell you, these interests can quickly grow out of control when working on teacher gifts and class activities.  Because of the teacher thing, I like to “file” all of my ideas to be used or shared later.  Hopefully, other people might find some useful ideas posted here or have their own ideas to add.