Arrghhh...It's A Pirate Birthday Party!

As of Sunday evening our little family was officially back to some sort of normalcy. Pete arrived home Friday afternoon after being away for business for months- literally. We spent the weekend celebrating Nate's 4th birthday along with visiting family and friends. It was a wonderful weekend full of smiles, laughs, sweets, good conversation, great gifts for the birthday boy, sword fights, (pretend!) yoga class (thanks Kara!) and much more.

On Sunday evening after our weekend visitors parted ways and all the party dust had settled, Pete and I made a huge effort to get Nate and Jules into the bath early and to sleep in their beds by 8 pm. We sat at the kitchen table alone (wow! it's been so long!) and enjoyed fresh, homemade pasta and sauce, salad and bread. We talked about our upcoming weekend away, about Nate's party, and about us. It was great to have him home, and feel the comfort of a connection we haven't been able to enjoy in a long time with his being gone so much.

Krista and I worked hard on Friday to plan the details of the pirate themed birthday party (thanks to one of my more unfavorable characteristics of being a slight procrastinator). We decorated the pirate ship cake too- and now after three years of her helping me decorate birthday cakes, she is officially my cake-maker partner in crime. On Saturday afternoon the party began and after guests arrived, we kicked things off by reading the story, Talk Like A Pirate to the kids. After the story, they all had a chance to test their own "pirate talking" skills. Then they played a "Hook the Treasure" game, where they used plastic cups with "hooks" coming out of the end (pipe cleaners in the shape of a hook) to pick up pretzels out of a bowl. They all received gold chocolate coins and toy compasses for playing the games.

And of course, no pirate themed birthday party would be complete without a treasure hunt. We took photos of random objects in the backyard (the hammock, the bird feeder, soccer net, etc...) and printed out the photos to use as clues for the mostly pre-reading kids. The last clue led them to the fort at the top of the swing set, where we had hidden a treasure chest shaped pinata inside of a Rubbermaid container with a sign that said, "Pirate Loot!" They LOVED it!!

They ran around the yard working great as a team and found all of the clues.

We tied the pinata to the swing set and had them each wear two eye patches instead of a blindfold to swing at it!

Cake, ice cream, and gifts followed. Overall, it was a great success!