Smell the Forest: 2010

We have the privilege of having our youngest two kids' birthdays very close to each other, so every year is of a little bit of a challenge when it comes to choosing how to celebrate. Each of them has their own ideas (and I don't want to spoil the fun of having the spotlight on each of them), but several of their friends are in the same families, so having two separate parties is a little inconvenient for the guests. Plus, we're really of the mindset that birthdays should be family affairs. I LOVE that my teenage daughters and her best friends always request to have huge family dinners together before their celebration begins in full force, and the two youngest are no different. So what do we do with several families with babies to teens, on a hot summer day, that won't be too difficult to plan? A WILD WATER PARTY! Who doesn't love to get soaked trying the impossible task with a heavy laden water bomb?! We did this last year as well, and I got so many requests from friends to do it again, that the decision was pretty easy. I just had to find some different games to keep it interesting.
To start, we live next to the best regional park on the planet, Fox Run. It offers great shade with huge spans of grassy fields, playgrounds, hiking trails, a lake, and a perfect mountain view to enjoy throughout our fun. We found a great shady spot close to the bathrooms and playground and away from other large groups of park-goers. I started the party at 11:00 and asked families to bring their own picnic lunch (less prep on my part!) and I would take care of the cake and birthday yummies.
Our games were mostly relays: pairs racing each other with a large balloon pressed between their back, the balloon squat, in which each kid runs with a large balloon, but has to sit on it to pop it before they tag the next teammate, teams filling a narrow-mouthed bottle that is resting on someone's forehead with a cup of water while standing over them, and another one that entails teams racing to dunk clothes into buckets of water, putting them on and taking them off as quickly as they can and passing them to the next person in line, who also has to dunk everything before they dress. The hit of the party was the three-person balloon sling shot, though. If you haven't seen this, it's basically surgical tubing with a cloth patch in the center. Two adults (you need the strength) hold both ends while the third person pulls the middle and launches the balloon. With good technique, you can easily launch one 500 ft, at least! At the party, we had a distance contest. We very quickly drew the attention of other park goers who asked to get in on the fun as well. It's a GREAT toy! We often use it in the winter with snowballs as well (but ONLY for distance or accuracy contests! It requires quite hard snowballs and would do some SERIOUS damage if it hit someone or something , like a window or car windshield, or person!)
Making the cake was the most fun of getting ready for the party. We're all fans of the food shows and especially some of the cake ones (one guy made a life-size replica of his wife for her birthday), so we like to get a little imaginative. Collectively, we came up with the idea of a cake that looks like grass with a water balloon popping on it and the water splashes coming up out from the balloon. Sounded a little daunting, but was actually very easy. The water splashes were made by boiling corn syrup, sugar and water to soft crack stage (295 degrees) and then very quickly pouring them onto a cool sheet of tin foil in random splotches. As soon as they cool, they can be carefully peeled off . I didn't set them into the cake until a couple hours before serving, as the moisture in the cake may start to dissolve the sugar if it's in there for a long time. Meg helped bake, Mia helped with the grass, and Carrie made letters with fondant to decorate two sides of the cake, one side for each of the two birthday girls. It came out far better than any of us expected! To top off the birthday treats and to cool everyone off, we brought along our snow cone maker and syrups.