A Shark Party in the Backyard
Last week was crazy busy! I spent the better part of the week getting ready for Tater's 6th birthday party on Saturday, but the kids were out of school for two days during the week--Tuesday for an e-learning day and Wednesday for Veteran's Day--so that took up a lot of my time as well.
Wednesday also happened to be Tater's actual birthday, so we celebrated by taking the kids to our favorite recreational facility--McWane Science Center! This was our first time going there since the coronavirus quarantine began last March, and it was a little bit different. Social distancing, etc., in a hands-on children's museum is a little interesting, to say the least. For starters, a lot of the hands-on exhibits had been closed, so there wasn't as much to play with/on, but we chose to focus on looking and listening to exhibits that the kids had previously been too busy playing to really notice, and we all had fun after all!
I encouraged the kids to really examine the fossils in the Alabama dinosaur exhibit, comparing the size of the model T-rex, Allosaurus and Appalachiosaurus arms on display (Which one was the biggest? T-rex. Which one had the longest arm? Appalachiosaurus), and I think this was the first time that it really sunk in with Tater that during dinosaur times, Alabama was covered with a huge inland sea! He and Curly were amazed by the skeletons of the giant turtles, giant fish, and mosasaurs on display. Sure, they had seen them before, but this was the first time they really looked at them.
Most of the first-floor exhibits are still open to the public (I bet they do a LOT of sanitizing surfaces there!), and the girls had fun playing with colored shadows, while Tater helped his daddy figure out the combinations for cracking different safes.
The highlight of the trip for Tater was when we went down to the Lower Level to see the different aquariums, and he got to see a plaster cast of a real, live Megalodon tooth. Now, if you don't know what those are, they were only the biggest sharks to ever roam the oceans, measuring somewhere between 34-52 ft. long, and considered extinct since the beginning of the Ice Age. Tater is obsessed with them, so it was a huge thrill to get to see the tooth. Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of that moment, but I include here a picture of a real Megalodon tooth and another of a model of its jaws that I found on the internet just to give you an idea of how big these fish were.
With Tater's current obsession with sharks, it was a no-brainer what the theme of his birthday party was going to be. Over the years, I have learned to go easy on myself when it comes to birthday parties. I really enjoy themed parties--it's fun to make the crafts, think up creative food, etc.--but as an overachieving perfectionist, it can be really easy to overcommit myself and get majorly stressed out. There's just no point in that. As far as the kids are concerned, if there's cake and presents and possibly friends to play with, they're happy. Everything else is just icing on the cake (to coin a phrase 😉). So I stick to a cheap venue (our house), focus most of my creative energy on the cake, and find a few easy, inexpensive decorations that I can make with little fuss and then recycle for future parties or use to decorate their rooms. Here's what I came up with.
First, the cake. I really wanted a cake that looked like a shark, but a repeated search of Pinterest (my go-to for ideas) only yielded round, square or rectangular cakes that had sharks stuck on them, but none that were actually shark-shaped. Finally, I did a Google search and came across a cake that looks like Bruce the shark from Finding Nemo. Eureka! I found it!
What I love about this cake especially was how easy it was to make and how easy it is to store. It's just a two-layer circle cake with blue and white icing (I promise it was super easy to decorate!), and the fins and tail I simply formed out of Rice Krispies and then coated with dark blue icing. Frankly, it's probably one of the easiest birthday cakes I've made in a loooong time!
For the decorations, I recycled some blue circle garland I saved from Tater's 1st birthday (it was a Cookie Monster party 😍), and made a shark and fish garland I downloaded for free from Ann Le Do's blog. (If you want to make your own circle garland, too, she has a free download for that as well, but I already had one, so...)
The signs were free downloads from the blog Rock Your Homeschool that I then colored and laminated; they were part of an awesome free shark week activity pack that I also printed out as party favors for the kids.
The other party favor I found online were these really cool shark facts booklets from Royal Baloo. I loved the chance to share with the kids about how awesome sharks really are--they're not nearly as scary as most people think; they're really amazing, fascinating creatures that God has made. The bookmarks were a little bit of work to cut out, but not that bad really, and the only thing I would improve on them would be to maybe add a few more sharks, like the biggest living--the whale shark--, the smallest--the dwarf lantern shark--, and then because of Tater, the Megalodon. 😋
Finally, I scored this cute silicon candy mold on the clearance aisle at JoAnn's Fabrics and made little chocolate candies with some melted-down rainbow chips left over from Monkey's birthday party (I had bought melting chocolate, but the rainbow was more fun!). Mmmmm!
To put it all together, I used these shark- and beach-themed buckets I couldn't pass up at the Dollar Tree in June. (Yes, I plan that far ahead for birthday parties. When you want an ocean-themed party in November, you have to do this kind of planning.😁)
We kept the menu simple--hot dogs and chips--and, just to add in something blue, I made some chocolate covered pretzels for fun.
We had the party in the backyard because Tater's second obsession is Nerf guns, and he was dead set on having a Nerf battle with his friends during the party. So he and his sisters and friends ran around and shot at each other with Nerf guns, then we ate and opened presents on the lawn.
I didn't mind because it's much easier to social distance outside (if any of the guests were concerned about that), and because, finally, after 7 months of work, our backyard is completely cleaned up from the April tornado! And, if I do say so myself, it looks pretty good! Cue the before and after pictures!
And now:
I'm especially relieved that we were finally able to get the arborists in here last week to clean up all the dead limbs still hanging above where we could reach to remove them in the trees (those guys had been REALLY busy these last few months!). Yes, the new siding and shutters are nice (the front of the house is transformed!), but those widow-makers really made us nervous about the kids playing in the backyard all these months. Now, it's all clean and safe, perfect for these glorious autumn days! I predict many more outdoor days to come!
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