Life gets busy here at Mimi’s House. I can’t believe a whole year has come and gone since I first started this blog! Thank you to all of my readers for you support and encouragement! I am so glad that you took the time to stop by and visit my site and hopefully along the way you’ve been able to gather some creative ideas to use in your own home and classroom.
February is a busy month for us as we have several birthdays in our family as well as Valentines Day to celebrate. (For some fun and creative Valentines to make visit last year’s Feb. post)
This year Malachi chose Pirates as the theme for his birthday party. This was a very fun and simple theme that can be incorporated for a boy or girl. I have even used this theme when teaching preschool and I must say they LOVED it! To achieve the Pirate look, use black and red decor throughout. I made my own printables for the snack table which made it fun for the kids.
The cake was a treasure chest. I was short on time so it didn’t turn out as well as I had hoped but the birthday boy was happy with it and that is what counts! To make the treasure chest cake you need two loaf pans, golden cake mix, chocolate icing and some “jewels”. Fill one of the loaf pans only 1/4 full of batter. This will serve as your lid. Once cake is baked, hollow out the “treasure chest” . Save some of the cake pieces to prop up the lid. Place “lid” on top of treasure chest and ice entire cake except for the inside. Place jewels inside cake and you are set to go!
Other snacks we had were hotdog Pirate Ships, Canon Balls (cheese puffs), Fish and Chips (fish crackers and potato chips), Shark Blood (punch), and Ocean Water (water bottles). The kids loved the funny names we gave the food.
Games we played were “Pin the Patch on the Pirate”, “Treasure Hunt”, and “Fishing”.
For Pin the Patch on the Pirate, I drew a simple pirate face onto poster board and the kids took turns getting blindfolded and tried to place a patch on the pirate’s eye.
The treasure Hunt was the most fun. The children took turns finding clues hidden throughout the house which finally led to a Treasure Chest filled with candy and Pirate’s Loot! The fishing game was a bed sheet draped between a doorway and the kids placed a fishing rod (wooden dowel with twine and attached clothespin) over the “water” (bedsheet). Someone was hiding on the other side and attached a prize to the rod when they went fishing..or sometimes a smelly sock or other fun item would appear! This got lots of laughs but of course they all eventually ended up with a nice prize to take home.
All in all it was a great day to be a Pirate!