The First Annual Big Birthday Bash, Part 1

This party was huge!  I've had parties with nearly this many kids before (remember the one last spring with 40 some kids?), but this one had about the same number of kids (at dinner the head count was a little over 40), but there were a lot more parents staying for the fun - we had a little over 20 adults present!

The really big part was how much planning/games/fun we did!  There were 3 parts to this party - team games, BBQ dinner, and then a Carnival!

I'm going to share some of the party tonight, but there's so many great photos and things that happened, that I'm going to break it up into a couple of posts!

First, here's some great people photos (my dear friend, Renee, was our official photographer for the party, and she was gracious enough to let me have all the photos after the party for my own personal use!  She is so great at people pics! - check out her new website for her new business, Little Earthling Photography !  Congrats Renee! And thanks for all the great photos - now I REALLY want a new camera!)

First, here's the babies that were present - totally ignored the proceedings, but they served as great entertainment for the adults:

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="397" caption="Esther"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Caleb"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Zeke"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Elizabeth"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Josh"][/caption]

Are those some of the cutest babies in the world or what???  They were all born within 3 months of each

other!

And here's some pics of bigger kids waiting for the action to begin:

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Dayton - already had face painting, as you can see"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Elizabeth - post face painting too!"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Hezekiah - doesn't seem too impressed with the party so far!"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Jubilee - one of the most photogenic children I've ever seen "][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Kellina"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Rachel and Kalina"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Rebekah and Keziah"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Zoe"][/caption]

Ok, so now that you've gotten to meet some of the "players", we'll get into the fun stuff - team games!  We divided all the kids up into 4 teams - lined them up by age and counted them off into teams.  Then the teams nominated a captain or two and lined up for the games.  We had some late comers, but we just added them to teams as best we could to keep things as fair as possible.  We were working with kids from 2 - 25!  We were in good hands though, as the oldest team member is an EMT from the Ferndale Fire Department - he was such a good team captain and for some reason seemed right at home in some of the events (like where he got to carry two kids in a relay race, and jumping rope!).  Everybody was so helpful and encouraging...it was good to see kids of all ages work so well together!

The first game was the pancake toss - you had to toss a pancake from you flimsy paper plate over your head for the person behind you to catch it on their plate - if it was dropped the same people had to try again until success.  Once the pancake reached the back of the line, the last person ran to the front and started it again...over and over until the first front person ran back to the front!  Here's some great pics of the action:

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Wes and Jonathan Demonstrating"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="On Your Mark"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Get Set"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Go!!!"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Up and Over"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Catch It"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Ok everyone, let"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Nice and Easy"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Help"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="The Big Toss to Keziah"][/caption]

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="400" caption="Scary toss to Jessica"][/caption]

Well, I had hoped to get more games in tonight, but my computer/connection is realy giving me fits - so I'll have to continue another day - stay tuned!

Have a blessed day!