Michael's Birthday Party

Michael turned 29 on Thursday, April 5th. He is nervous about turning 30, so I wanted to make his 29th birthday extra special. I decided to do a "little kid" themed party - basically the idea was that this was Michael's "last year of childhood", since he will be such an old man next year. I ordered invitations that looked like invites to a little boy's birthday party. And of course, since Michael works for Wrangler, I thought the cowboy was appropriate. Michael didn't know that I had sent out little kid invites or that he was having a little kid party. He was quite surprised!

We started out the party with a cook-out. We had hamburgers, hotdogs, chips, potato salad, and baked beans. Everyone brought their own tables and chairs so we were able to all eat outside in the backyard. I was afraid that it was going to rain or be cold at the party, but the weather turned out to be beautiful!

Everyone received those streamer things that unravel when you blow into them. I'm not sure what they're called, but they are definitely a little kid birthday party item!

The back patio was all decked out for the party. We had a pinata and pin the "S" on Superman's chest. Since Michael was always into Superman as a kid, I figured it would be more appropriate than having pin the tail on the donkey.

Here's an upclose shot of the pinata. Pretty cool, huh? I wanted to stay with the cowboy theme on this one. We filled it with real candy - nothing fun sized. It had packs of gum, Starbursts, Skittles, Reeses Peanut Butter Cups, and Peanut M&Ms. One guest even said "adult pinatas rock!"

After eating all the food, we played some little kid party games. Of course we played pin the "S" on Superman. This is Brandon trying to pin the "S" on. He and Whitney are the kids of our friends Andrea and Andrew, and the only kids over 4 months old at the party. They had a blast and thought the party was just for them. :) David Harris won this game.

We also had a three-legged race. This proved to be most hilarious as most adults have not three-legged raced in years. Of course, our friends are super competitive like us, so there were some (un)intentional pushes to throw people off and a few couples fell down. Michael and I were pretty good at this, but nobody could come close to beating Erika and Jeremy Holmes. They were miles ahead of everyone and said they always felt like they would be good at three-legged racing.

We also did an egg carrying relay race, but I don't have any pictures of that. Our team won - me, Michael, Seth, and Greg. We had to balance and egg on a spoon and run it down the yard and back without dropping.

I made Michael wear a birthday "hat" to create the full little kid effect. Instead of a traditional birthday cake, I made star-shapped cupcakes. It was strawberry cake with funfetti/rainbow chip icing. Yummy! You can't really tell, but that is a cookie sheet covered in star cupcakes. Each cupcake has it's own candle. It was so windy outside, only one candle was still lit for Michael to blow out by the time we finished singing "happy birthday" to him. I think that's all he really needs though for his wish to come true.

And of course, we had to break the pinata and get all the goodies inside. I used the handle on our Swiffer Sweeper as the pole to swing with. Because it unscrews, Michael thought pinata nunchucks would be more fun than a pinata pole. I wish I would have taken a picture of the candy going everywhere. That's another fun thing about adult pinatas. One good wack and all the candy's out!

Michael did get a few gag-gift presents for his party. Jeremy got him the shirt that he's holding up in the picture. "That's how we roll" is their favorite phrase to say - it's evidently applicable in any and all occasions - so Michael loves that he now has a shirt that has coined his favorite phrase!

We had a blast at Michael's party and really appreciated all the party guests who attended for helping make the party so fun. Next year we'll have an old man party since Michael will be so ancient and 30!