When 8 becomes 9

E turned 9 over the Thanksgiving holiday so we decided to hold her party in the early part of December so that all of her friends could celebrate with her. The party was this past Saturday - she planned the whole thing and took charge of getting her friends in order :o)
This is the cake I made for the festivities. She wanted her "favorite" chocolate cake. So that is what I baked - 2 layers with raspberry jam in the middle. Covered with melted chocolate. Then I tried to get fancy. Heavy on the "tried"!! I melted white chocolate chips and thinned them with a little bit of crisco. Then dropped little circles around the cake and dragged a skewer through them to make the harts (some more successfully than others!) - notice that there are 9 of them :o). No matter, she loved it and it tasted good so not a total disaster! Although I think it could qualify as one of the cakes featured on Cake Wrecks.

All E really wanted to do was to play games with her friends. She made a list of games that she thought would be fun. This balloon game was the first - the kids stand in a circle and starting with one balloon try to keep it in the air - not letting it touch the floor - gradually more balloons are added one by one until chaos insues. All my kids love this game! The next game was telephone (such a classic party game) and then freeze dance. After which they were ravenous and we ate dinner.

After dinner, the girls created night shirts to sleep in and to take home instead of a goodie bag. They are just large men's t-shirts from Costco and permanent markers. Sooooo very easy!!

Then another favorite game - Frozen T-shirts. This one requires a little bit of prep as the T-shirts need to be soaked in water, squeezed out, folded up and then put into the freezer for a few days to freeze solid.

The object of this game is to pry it open and be the first to actually get it on. This can be quite a challenge and takes a bit longer than one might expect :o) After they all got the cold shirts on, they went into the hot tub to warm up. Then onto cake, ice cream and gifts.

Here are all the girls in their nightshirts ready for bed.

The next morning E had more fun games planned. Mummy wrapping - the kids pair up and wrap eachother in toilet paper to make them look like mummies. They have a certain amount of time and then the wrappee escapes from her wrapping and the partners trade places.

This year the kids got quite creative.....

Adding all kinds of props!

The last game was to build a free standing structure using only straws and masking tape. This group is talking strategy.

The winners!! This structure was taller than my husband who is 5' 11" tall!

This is the other structure. Hmmmm.....glad they didn't design my house :o)

E and her friends had a great time!! Way to go 9 year old!