Mine Craft Party

My kids love Minecraft.  It is pretty much like unlimited Legos that you never step on barefoot or have to clean up.  I have even enjoyed playing it some.  It can be addictive so I limit playtime.  Last October I was seeing some nifty ideas for using Minecraft themed Halloween decorations.  I used some boxes to make a Creeper:

I spray painted it green and used black crepe paper to add a face.  For some reason I didn't take another picture of it yet.  So once I get it down again (it's put away up high in the garage) I will update this post with a picture of the finished Creeper.

My kids loved it and my daughter asked for a Minecraft birthday party.  Her birthday is in January and it has been challenging for me to plan birthday parties at all let alone immediately following Christmas and New Year.  However, I am done being pregnant and nursing so I didn't have much excuse really.  I was in a hurry though so I had her pick a pre-made image for the invitation and I used Paint to add the personal info (no I am too cheap for Adobe Photoshop).  The blank place at the bottom right is where I put the address and phone number.

After I looked up some ideas and we visited Party City.  We found out that Minecraft hasn't released much for other vendors to sell.  We made do with our own creativity.  My husband was disappointed with his rush job on the cake but I think he did great with the little time he had.  We got some figurines to add the finishing touch.

Minecraft cake

We knew we would be indoors due to the rain.  So I came up with the idea of having "stations" for the kids to play.  I pulled our our mega bloks for the bedroom since I would have an age range of toddler to pre-teen.  I would have pulled out legos if it was mainly older kids or possibly both but I was still recovering from Christmas remember?  I set up another table and put the laptop next to our desktop so the kids could have a station to play Minecraft.  I asked my friend to do face painting and she did an amazing job.  She set up at the same table and the kids were glad to get a turn and the other stations kept them busy while they waited.  I also like using crafts to keep kids busy.  I wasn't super prepared but kids love decorating the bag for collecting the pinata goodies.  So I decided to decorate my card table to look like a craft table.  I bought a plastic table cover from the dollar store and just drew on it.

 I made a Ghast pinata out of cardboard box and white wrapping paper and tissue.  I drew the face on it with markers.  The legs are white crepe paper.  The best part about using a cardboard pinata instead of a paper mache one is that the kids can hit it as hard as they like and everyone can get a turn.  To make sure it would break open I taped two the flaps inward.  Then I told my oldest child (the last one to take a turn) to hit the bottom of it and in 2 hits the treasures were released.

Since it was raining outside we set it up in the Garage.  If I had more forethought I would have made the door to the garage look like a Nether portal with black and purple crepe paper but I lacked purple.

piñata

 I saw an enderman made from black poster board and crepe paper so that was easy to copy. I used lavender paper and purple marker to make the eyes and sparkles.  I wish I had put it some where else and we could have had the kids do a version of pin the tail on the donkey since the Enderman usually holds something.  But it worked as a decoration anyway.

  Samples of my friend's excellent talent.

I decided to use our leftover Halloween candy (not much) and some miniature Rubiks cubes and some decorative diamonds from Party City as prizes in the Pinata.  The kids all got a few things in their bags but not too much junk or candy which made all the parents happy.

We were also lucky to find square plastic plates at Party City just the right color of diamond in Minecraft.  I served dinner on them.  We saved them because I foresee more Minecraft parties in our future.  I was also grateful to have 2 other moms stick around to help me manage the kids and we made sure everyone had a good time.  Good Luck on your Minecraft party endeavors!

LEGEND OF ZELDA BIRTHDAY PARTY

Legend of Zelda was easily my most favorite video game as a child.  Our kids like watching us play the new versions and for my son's birthday party we are using Legend of Zelda as our theme.

Here is what we did with notes on what worked.  First off I am glad we didn't get all 8 kids we invited.  We had four 10 year old kids with a few siblings ranging from 5 to 12.  To top it off my throat got sore and I could barely talk.  Luckily, I had two other adults stay plus my husband and my mom available to help.

The invitation used the original Legend of Zelda opening scene.  We used the print screen function on the computer to save the image and my husband used Adobe Photoshop to mess around with it.
It is really easy to find Legend of Zelda images using Google.
Inside the invitation is where I got creative:

YOU ARE INVITED TO 

JOIN OUR QUEST 

FOR (insert child's name)

BIRTHDAY PRESENTS 

AND THE TRIFORCE 

CAKE ON

 (insert Date)

(insert Time)

COME TO HYRULE AT

(insert Address)

RSVP (insert your number)

Using the original Hyrule Map I created a map of our house using Paint to cut and paste.  My plan was to make a level out of each room and present a challenge to be conquered.

Level 1 was a printed maze that our printer makes randomly.  We made several and wrote a 1, 2, and 3.  There are several unused drawers in my daughter's room so the kids worked their way through the maze to each number and allowed them to open a drawer as they reached it.  The kids really liked the idea.  The items they got were a key and 2 flashlights.

Level 2 was a dark room (in another bedroom).  The kids used a flashlight to find the chest hidden in the room.  It contained small balloons filled with air and attached to curling ribbon.  The instructions were to tie a balloon around the ankle and go to the living room for the monster stomping game.  The rules of the game was to pop everyone else's balloon with your feet and try to avoid their feet popping your balloon.  The kids liked the game a lot so we did it twice.  A couple kids that didn't like the popping sound covered their ears or just watched and waited for the next game.

Level 3 was in another bedroom.  We set up a Jenga tower with 3 blocks marked with a key, a compass and a chest.  We played with Jenga rules, building the tower as we pulled out blocks.  When the tower fell, they had to start over again (like dying in the game).  When the kids found all 3 blocks they have beaten the level.  Unfortunately, not all the kids were patient with this game.  I had to tell one to back off because he kept knocking over the tower when it wasn't his turn.  I also took away some of the dud blocks so it was easier to find the right ones after a few tries.  Once they succeeded they opened the chest in the room and found boomerangs (purchased for 50 cents a piece at Party City) and 2 sling shots I found at the Dollar tree.  We supplemented the sling shot ammunition with a package of table tennis balls.  (I think my husband found them at Albertson's).

Level 4 was in the Garage.  We had a good battle idea.  Paper bats hanging from the ceiling.  My husband took over this idea and taped the bats to string and hung them from the rafters.  He used Halloween decorations and scattered storage tubs around the room to add decor and difficulty.  His goal was to use the boomerangs and slingshots to knock the bats down, but tape was stronger or the paper wasn't heavy enough.  Either way the kids finally knocked them down when they climbed on the boxes and hit the bats with their boomerangs melee style.  He also added to the difficulty by requiring the flashlights to be used again but eventually had to turn on a lamp anyway.  We had to use our daughter's toy box to hold the last treasures also purchased at the dollar tree:  water shooter tubes and beach balls.  (Edit:  I noticed in October the 99 cent store sold squeaking rubber bats that hang.  So cool, I just had to share that if you plan ahead you can get better than paper.)

This game had to be played in the backyard.  I thought the water shooter tubes looked a lot like arrows.  The Classic game included killing Gannon with silver arrows.  So the way I thought to incorporate them was to have a race.  The kids would spray the beach balls across the yard.  Theoretically, it was a great idea and the kids took turns racing and enjoyed it.  But, I didn't have enough voice to keep it organized.  At that point they were all just having a good time anyway.  In my mind, I was going to have them team up and do a relay and work together, but taking turns racing each other in pairs worked too.

The climatic event really was the Dragon Pinata from Party City.  If I had more time we could have made one but this worked great.  My husband used a flag pole and our porch railing was a fulcrum so he could move it around to "attack" the kids.  It was quite amusing to watch and the triumphant finish was perfect as the dragon was beheaded.  We filled it with Jolly Ranchers because it resembles rupees pretty well.

We had gathered all the gifts out in the backyard as the Dragon's hoard and we proceeded to watch our birthday boy open his presents.  The Triforce cake was presented by my husband.  He used a baking sheet and two cake mixes, but it allowed him to create 3 equilateral triangles.  After that the kids just wanted to play with each other so ends my tale.

I had a lot of great ideas I did not get to use because of a lack of time to prepare, but for what we accomplished I put this party down as a great success.  Feel free to use any of the ideas I have described.

Other things I considered doing in no particular order:
Setting up the food table like a potion shop.
Giving the kids rupees (as jolly ranchers or paper rupees or something) to spend on the games or other places.
Giving the kids each a Link hat to wear and a "heart container."
Using water balloons as "bombs" to aim at a large picture of a Classic Legend of Zelda monster.
Drawing a picture of Gannon on the beach ball.
Incorporating finding the piece of triforce in each level.

Once Upon A Time

I have a fun game that I love because it inspires creativity.  It is simply called "Once Upon A Time."  I acquired my copy when I worked at The Gamekeeper (before it was bought out by Hasbro games).  The rules are designed for a group of people to tell a story together.  The story can be passed around by interruptions using the cards or if a person starts confusing the story from what has been told or if they get stuck and pass.  Everyone has a goal to use all of the cards in their hand and bring the story to their "Ending" card which makes the telling more fun.  The other rules to know are that each card must be significant to the story's telling and must have their own sentence in order to be added to the story.

Just for fun I will tell a story using the cards I have chosen randomly from the deck:

Once upon a time there was a very strong boy who grew up in a tiny village in the middle of nowhere.  He worked on a farm and could heft twice as much as any other boy his age.  Even some of the men could not lift the heavy loads he could.  He parents loved him and wanted to see him do well, but they also needed him to survive.  Their farm was very prosperous because of his great strength and they would have to hire out at least three people to do the work he could by the time he was 18.

One day, George, (the very strong boy) could no longer stand living in anonymity and insisted his father give him money to set out on his journey to make his own way in the world.  His father refused to give his son the money, but pleaded with him to stay one more year so they could bring the harvest in to pay for workers next year.  They argued back and forth and in his anger George struck his father with an awful blow.  His father collapsed from the pain and George cried out in agony at his own stupidity.  He carried his father to the doctor, who treated the wound swiftly but it was more than the father could bear.  He passed away in the night.  George discussed the matter with his mother who was more understanding and forgiving than he could have expected.  She insisted that they sell the farm to their neighbors who could jointly afford it and leave together.  George being her only child felt his duty to take care of his mother and promised that she would live comfortably no matter what job he found.

They set off together on a fine misty morning taking the only road they knew that led to another small town.  In the next town, George was able to purchase a pair of fine horses with the money from their farm and spared some for provisions as they traveled.  He also asked around for jobs that may need a strong hand, but the town was not in need.  One merchant that traded with the travelers said he heard a rumor that the king of the province was looking for a strong man for an odd job but he did not know much more about it.  The merchant shared that the road to the castle was through the forest east of the village and George and his mother, Marda, headed that direction.

The forest was thick and the path was hard to see.  They had no experience with forests having grown up in the plains, but George persisted.  Soon, they lost the path entirely and had to camp for the night.  In the middle of the night the croaking sound awoke George.  He opened his eyes to see a frog right in front of him.  The frog croaked insistently and George followed the frog's gaze to a knotted old oak behind him.  George got up and examined the oak more closely.  He found a rabbit hole beneath and something shining within.  George awakened his mother and she suggested they wait for daylight to see more clearly.  The frog leaped in and croaked loudly again.  George reached in and found coins.  He delightedly pulled a fist full of gold from the hole.  His mother was not delighted.  She feared they had found the hiding place of some stolen treasure and begged her son to replace the money.  George refused.  He dug all the money out and after doing so the frog came out of the hole and leaped upon the horse's saddle.  It was clear the frog intended to see them through the forest to George so he and Marda mounted and the frog led them back to the path they had lost.

The castle had a wall and moat but the bridge was open and George and his mother were permitted to enter to find out more about the job with the King.  George found a nice place for his mother to stay and left the money with her.  She did not want him to because she was still fearful, but George promised he could return to check on her.  The King did have a job for George.  It was not what George had hoped for though.  The king wanted many strong men to help build better roads to all the villages in his province.  George was sure he could find a better job that his strength was suited for.  When he returned to his mother he found her in a fit of tears.  The frog was continuing to croak incessantly at her and she did not want to stay in its presence a moment longer.  George took the money and asked the frog what it wished him to do.  The frog led them back to the horses and back along the road they had come.

The frog ended at the grave of George's father. It hopped maddeningly back and forth from the grave to the farm to George's mother.  Finally, George realized he must buy the farm back for his mother and run it as he had been raised to do, but he refused.  He tossed the coins at his mother and shouted, "Do what you will with them!"  Then he picked up the frog and ran away so she could be bothered no more by its croaking.  As for fame or fortune George's pride could never be satisfied with any work great or small.  He lived the rest of his life as a beggar...which was perfectly just.