.Pirate Party.

Today was Pirate Party day. I can't remember whose idea it was to go with the pirate themed party - mine or Oscars? Never mind...we both thought it was pretty cool!
Oscar had such a fun day with lots of his little friends coming around to play. Lil was a bit feral (who would think to hold a party during her nap time?) but we all still had a fun time.
The kids started off decorating pirate hats with stickers, they all looked very cute wearing them - I wish I took more/better photos of the day but kept forgetting!We played pass-the-parcel and inside each layer was a pirate eye patch and little treat.
After a game of Pin the Eye Patch on the Pirate and "What's The Time Mr Pirate?" we ate lunch. Jaron made little pirate ships out of some wood scraps and dowel and as the kids finished eating we gave them a piece of fabric and some textas to decorate a sail to stick onto their ships.
Earlier in the week I went around the backyard and took photos of different things and made a treasure map on the computer. The kids had to follow the map to all of the different landmarks and collect gold coins at each spot.
And...voilla...the treasure at the end of the map...
This cake was *almost* a total disaster. I should probably have used a recipe I had tried before but decided to use a marble cake recipe I found online. The cake was fine, just didn't rise as much as I would have liked and ended up only being about 5cm high. Not tall enough to make a decent treasure chest. Lucky for me, I have a husband with good ideas! He always seems to "save the birthday cake day" - he propped the cake up with Tupperware containers to make it look higher then I iced around the cake AND containers and you couldn't even tell it wasn't all cake! I like to call it "cake plastic surgery"!! The lid was made out of a cardboard box (thanks to Jaron) and I just iced the outside of it! We were pretty impressed with the end result and it was actually better than a huge cake because it meant that most of it was eaten at the party and we didn't have any wastage. A few of the kids said that it was the best cake they had ever seen...bless their hearts...but from a child's point of view I reckon any cake piled with lollies would be looking pretty enticing!
Our happy pirates...I have a heap of left-over Make it Perfect bags from Quilt Market last year so used them as the take-home goody bags. Along with a few treats and little toys, I made each child a fishing set to take home and play with. They turned out really cute...but I wasn't feeling so enthused when I was cutting out, laminating and re-cutting 100 little fish! It was worth it in the end though!!