Catching up: D's Ninja Pool Party

I know I had started sharing stuff from our summer, but I just realized that I never did post these pictures from D's birthday party.  His actual birthday fell on Good Friday this year - not exactly primo party time ;)  And then we kept waiting for the weather to warm up so we could have a pool party... our spring was unseasonably cool!

Anyway, we finally managed to pull it off the Friday of Memorial Day weekend - one week before school ended.  I was sweating it out that morning, as we had some pretty substantial rain, and I did not have back-up activities planned for a crowd of boys.  I *needed* to be able to let them play in the pool!!  Thankfully it cleared in the afternoon, and we had a good, solid two hours of outside time.  As the boys arrived, they each made their own custom ninja headbands (white cotton torn into strips, and I set them loose with Sharpies) and then received an inflatable sword.  We let the kids just goof around in the pool and eat pizza for awhile, and then we ran a simple obstacle course: throw plastic ninjas in a bowl, crawl through a box (our water heater died about a month prior, and I held onto the box knowing we'd do SOMETHING with it!), hop across the pool noodle "ladder", spin around the tetherball pole, and then shoot the ninja with an arrow.  The last item actually ended up being the hardest - I had picked up a cheesy little bow & arrow set from the dollar store, and it was really tough to get the thing to shoot at all, much less at a target (even if it was only a shoe box 2 feet away).  The kids ran through it one at a time, and we kept timing them.  Wow, the power of competition!  The amazing thing was that 1 boy completed it in 12.3 seconds.  The kids swam a bit longer, but then sky was looking dark and ominous again, so we gathered everyone's gear up, and then headed inside for cake and opening gifts.

D was super excited about his cake - for A, I had just ordered a simple cake from the store, and then added a Lego set onto the top.  Well, seems we've unintentionally started a little tradition, as D requested the same treatment.  At least it makes things simple!  He ripped into his gifts - lots of Legos - and a couple of the kids immediately started in on building.  We realized we needed to provide another activity, and my hubby had the idea to cut up the water heater box and let the kids go stair sliding.  Holy cow, this was a smash hit!  Most houses in this area only have 1 floor, so even having steps is kind of unusual, and while the first kid to go down was a bit tentative, everyone was soon lining up.  I think it's safe to say a fun time was had by all... but I must admit to a bit of relief when everyone had gone home ;)