Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Going Overboard Again

Here are some pictures from Jedi Training Camp, a.k.a. Evan's birthday party. Once again I think I am going to make it a goal to only do homemade parties every other year.

In the interest of paying it forward, here's my Jedi party. So the little Jedis arrived for Jedi training camp and were given a Jedi robe. The Jedi Master (MJ) put them through a series of training exercises. They demonstrated their agility and speed by leaping out of a carbon freezer (plain box--didn't have time to gussy it up but would have painted it shimmery ice blue if I had time). They practiced swordfighting moves and kept balloons afloat with their light sabers. The Jedis also had to practice using the force to lift a crashed helicopter back into the sky. (Emma and her little friends were upstairs pulling it up with fishing line.) Here's Evan using the force:

Once the Jedis had passed their training, they had two final tests. R2D2 delivered a message from Princess Leia (filmed earlier and loaded onto my computer of Emma saying, "Help me Obi-Wan, you're my only hope"). The Jedis then went in search of the princess while fighting off some storm troopers. Their second test was to face ultimate evil: Cowboy Darth Vader. Again, the jeans and boots with the Vader costume just makes me chuckle. But what can you do?

Poor Darth was unsuccessful at turning anyone to the dark side. Luckily for him, those light sabers were made out of foam. By the way, the pool-noodle light saber has to be the best toy ever for boys. Take a pool noodle and cut it in half. Wrap some black electrical tape around one end and your boys will love it for weeks and weeks.

The Jedis then attended the awards ceremony where their valiant efforts were acknowledged by Princess Leia who placed peppermint patties around their necks. I mean silver medals.

Here's part of the gang hanging out at the Star Wars cantina. We had a menu of galactic grapes, Vader's veggies with Dagobah dip, Chewbaca chips, Jedi jigglers and Yoda soda. Emma and her friends were the waitresses. The best part, in my humble opinion, was snagging the Star Wars soundtrack from the library. It really set the mood and the cantina music from the original Star Wars was cracking me up. Just me really. But I am easily amused, you know. All in all I think it went off well considering we had to move it indoors at the last minute.

Halloween

I decided to try to catch up a little on my blog at the request of family members who were wanting to see some more pictures of the kids.

Here they are at Halloween: Princess Leia, Obi-Wan Kenobi and R2D2. Isn't R2 so cute? And he kept that hat on for me the whole time--probably because he soon realized that if he kept the hat on people would give him candy. Seriously, each time I turned around that kid had another sucker in his mouth.

Here's the family shot: Michael is Cowboy Darth Vader, I guess. I mean, jeans and cowboy boots? Sigh. Not that my costume is any better. By the time I'm finished with the kids' costumes there's no steam left. I have on a Jedi robe so I guess I'm supposed to be a Jedi master. Pathetic. At least the kids are cute.