Flashback Friday: Lego Birthday Party

Nine years ago on April 11th, the most beautiful baby boy was placed into my arms. And I officially began living on 'Cloud 9.' Well, except when I was cross-eyed and delirious with exhaustion. But even then, it was bliss to be cuddling with my brand-new baby. I had waited so long for him!

How nine years (and almost four months) have passed so quickly, I'll never, ever understand.

But they've been exciting ones. That's for sure.

Full of ups and downs, bumps and bruises (literally), highs and lows.

Well, this particular day was definitely a high, as we celebrated nine years of a blessed life by playing for two hours with friends.

Here's how it went down:

Invitations were emailed. I've started doing that lately. Remember the Christmas card?

A few decorations were put up.

(The giant yellow Lego brick is a vinyl tablecloth with yellow paper plates taped to it.)

The table was set. Extravagant, huh?

And a cake was baked.

Oh, let's don't discuss the cake.

*sigh*

Okay. Let's.

You see? The saga all began when, while at the cake supply store, Noah informed me that he doesn't really like cake. (??!!??!?) His reasoning was that most people buy their birthday cakes, and he doesn't like how gross those cakes make him feel. (Could have worse problems. Soooo glad I don't.) I assured him I would be baking the cake myself. Keeping this in mind, I decided against buttercream frosting, which is waaaay easier to decorate with, but would be far too sweet for Noah's taste. I went with 7-minute frosting, which I love. What I didn't realize was the fact that it's virtually impossible to get that kind of frosting to take a deep color. (I've only done pastels with it before. See this successful cake.) I was using blueberry juice to get a nice royal blue. But that didn't work. It was still white! Long story short, what I ended up with was an ugly gray color. (We rationalized that there ARE gray Lego bricks.) But it certainly didn't match the color scheme I had going, and what's worse is that I beat the frosting so very much trying to get the color right that it lost ALL its structure and was pretty much sugary soup by the time I put it on the cake. (I'm sure all that blueberry juice didn't help matters either!) All of that would have been worth it to know that Noah was happy with the way the cake tasted. But you know what? When it came time to serve the cake, that boy asked for ice cream ONLY!!! Tragic!!

But.

I did find a cool Lego birthday candle. :)

And now I know. Unless he changes his tune and begs me for cake (And I will make him beg!), no cake for Noah's parties! Which is just fine with me.

Okay. Back to the party itself.

The guests arrived.

And as they did, they joined the others on the couch where they could watch the Lego Star Wars duel tournament! The boys took turns. The coolest part was nobody was whining to have a turn. Some even opted not to play! They were all very content just watching the game on the big screen.

Some of them reeeeeeeally got into it!

Next we gathered at the table for a couple of Lego-building games.

I passed out paper plates to hold each boy's Legos. And they filled them with whatever blocks they wanted to use.

The first game we played was a timed game. They had three minutes to build the tallest tower they could without it falling over.

Then we did a guessing game sort of like Pictionary. I whispered the name of an object I wanted them to build for the others to guess. By this time, most of the boys were opting to work with a partner, and they did such a good job working together! They took the game very seriously and tried their very best to build things well. Here were some of the creations.

(a giraffe)

(a church)

(a cow)

(a tree)

And then we ATE.

And you know what? Not one boy said how dorky the cake looked. Bless their little hearts.

The hit of the party, apparently, was the big bowl of M&M's. Guess I should have stuck that Lego candle in the center and called it a day.

And then Paul, who surely grows wiser every year, decided to take the boys outside to the road to run some relays. We live on a very quiet, dead-end street, just perfect for relays with cooped-up boys. Besides, it was the only way to allow them to play outside, as the ground here was soaked from all the rain we'd had. (Remember, we've DONE the "Messy Party" thing already!) They had a blast just getting out and running like wild things!

Then we came inside and opened presents. Noah (and his parents) decided to specify "no gifts" or "just a book," as we are trying to avoid being inundated with stuff around here. This was one of my favorite moments, because the boys were all so happy to see Noah open their gift.

Noah and one of his friends even hugged each other when it was time for the child to leave!! Of their own volition!! Be still my heart.

The boys went home with these favors:

A Lego minifigure. A custom Lego coloring book. And a little bag of Lego-shaped candy. (I'm not all good all the time.)

All wrapped up in these bags:

I have to say this was a great party. The boys were just so involved with the Legos. I think I could have just walked away from the table and left them to play for a good solid hour. They were even quiet in their concentration! Which, if you know boys, isn't entirely typical. What I'm sayin' is...if you've got a boy age 6 to 11 or so, I highly recommend this theme.  ;)