Sam's Awesome Ninja Birthday!!

Sam turned 7 this year!!  I still can't believe he's that old.  He's been asking for weeks to have a ninja party, so we had a ninja party!  It was so fun, I was glad he thought of it!

This had to be easy since I'm 33 weeks pregnant.  So I bought some fortune cookies, some Panda cookies (found in the dollar section at Target), and I made the cutest sushi ever!  I cut a rice krispie treat in half (from the box I bought on coupon at Costco), put a swedish fish on it, and wrapped it in a fruit by the foot.  The whole thing took about 3 minutes.  Love.

For our little Thank You boxes to send home with Sam's friends, I put in some random Chinese candy, a Chinese drum, and a little Chinese notebook.  I realize that ninjas have more of a Japanese theme, but guess what?  These kids didn't know and I didn't tell them.

I made a ninja face cake (super easy, and I actually think it turned out really cute!!), and I found foam swords in the dollar section at Target.  I made the headbands out of a free t-shirt, all I had to do was personalize them with a little embroidery (that I finished 5 minutes before the kids showed up).

We played "Protect the Magical Orb" (keeping a balloon in the air using their ninja swords).  They loved it.

When the kids first arrived I had them draw a bad guy on a piece of paper.  I taped all the bad guys to a lifted cooler lid, and put them in our obstacle course.  They totally loved hitting the bad guys with their swords!

When we came in from the obstacle course I couldn't find my plate of sushi anywhere.  One of the kids found Molly behind a chair in the living room frantically eating all the swedish fish off the rice krispie treats.  She was furious when I took the plate away!  They were fine after I stuck some new fish on, and then I trained my ninjas how to eat with chopsticks.

After a rousing game of "Sensei Says" we moved on to the really important part of the afternoon...

Ninja cake and ice cream!  I didn't realize that I bought sparkler candles, which actually double as trick candles.  It took a few tries, but we finally got them blown out!

I seriously think this is really cute.  And it was really yummy too.  :)  I just used my Nothing Bundt Cake recipe, some canned frosting, a little bit of homemade fondant, and a couple of big chocolate chips.  Bam!  Ninja cake!  It's not like the design is complicated, or even original, but I came up with it myself (as in I didn't copy it from something I found online), so I totally felt like a hero.  Or a ninja.  :)

We finished off the afternoon with presents from Sam's awesome friends!  He really has great friends, we're pretty lucky to have such a wonderful neighborhood!

Sam is so fun, he's such an important part of our family!  He pays close attention to detail, and is always sure to let us know when something isn't right.  He's still an avid reader, and he loves to tell us about the books he's reading.  He loves the Hardy Boys, Encyclopedia Brown, Cam Jansen, The Magic Treehouse, and Droon.  He just started first grade two weeks ago, and he absolutely loves it!  His favorite thing is recess, but he loves school so much that he's actually waking up BY HIMSELF before school!  That was the hardest thing about Kindergarten...getting him out of bed.  We love first grade, and Mrs. DiPietro seems like a great teacher!
Sam can be very stubborn, but we can't imagine life without him!  He's a great big brother, and he really watches out for Will and Molly.  We're so happy he's in our family, we love him so much!  Happy birthday to our favorite 7 year old!!