Argh, Nathan is Five!!

Nathan was so excited to have a pirate party for his birthday. We dug out random fabric from the craft closet to make bandannas to go with our eye patches and gold earrings (or nose ring as Justin wore it). Nathan and Hyrum wore homemade felt pirate hats since they were our captains.

Our bandanna fabric naturally labeled us the "war" and "peace" teams which was perfect for our game of cannon shoot. Luckily, the peace team won but by only 2 cannons, it was a close match. I was worried about the older kids claiming boredom during the games but they were all in. Throwing ping pong balls at each other across the ping pong table trying to get them into the other team's basket while they were blocking them was evidently not too immature for them. We were laughing hysterically as we bombed each other while racing against the sand timer and some of us ended up in bit of pain from the occasional welt. No one under 6 was injured during the war.

For his gifts I had arranged a treasure hunt. A crumpled brown grocery bag and some Pictionary-esque drawings provided the clues as he ran from room to room looking for his treasure. He was thrilled to get a stick horse (which he had been begging for from the moment Hyrum got one for his birthday 2 weeks earlier and it has been a great investment into the imagination games so that they can ride together on their adventures). I also stained and decorated a treasure chest for him which has since held his weapons and costumes as well as the fake coins that he collected from his pirate party. He was also very happy with his leap frog reusable school book that will help him "get ready to be smart in kindergarten".

The cake was a huge success. Each birthday I struggle to come up with a cake that Nathan will like. He doesn't like cake. So this year I did a rice crispie "cake" in the shape of a pirate. He loved it!

*LeRoy was in Texas helping his sister re-wire her house.