12377

Ultimate Pirate Party 6yr - Hot Dog Ships

November 2005

Lorraine in Mount Pearl, Newfoundland, Canada

Runner-Up

The ultimate Pirate Birthday Party- 6 year old My son wanted a pirate themed party (his birthday is the day before Halloween), so being crafty, I had to take to the next level! I have a reputation to uphold! The invitations were done on yellow parchment looking computer paper. I used the backladder font on the computer. It read as follows: Ahoy there Matey! Ye be invited fer some birthday adventures at Captain Mackenzie's Buccaneer bash. Chart yer course for..address..onàdate ..we be meetin at a timefer some swashbuckling fun, grub and kiddie spirits. Wave yer flag if you be attendin, or have yer mum send word by yer phone to.. Phone numberà Sees ye there.. Aarrgghh! After they were printed (two to a page) I took a wet tea bag and wiped the paper to give it a more aged look, this also gives it a certain texture, I tore the paper around the edges to make it look more authentic. I also did a search on the net for pirate terms (dead man tell no tales.com and long john silver . Com are good ones) and typed up a page of pirate terms/ words and their meaning. i.e. aye- yes, cutlass- sword, me matey- a pirate term for friend, gangway!- move! Etc.. I wrote that who ever talked like a pirate the most would win a prize. I tea stained and tore this as well and rolled them both together and tied them with twine.

Decorations: I rented a community room as there were 34 kids invited( 27 showed up). I put three long banquet tables together and covered them with black plastic tablecloth. I scattered white skull confetti and plastic gold coins over the tables. I used 3 bundles of red, white, and black helium filled balloons tied with gold weights and put them on the ends and middle of the tables. I had clear plastic cups that had red napkins stuffed in them( unfold the napkin and grab the middle, place the middle end in the cup first), with a red straw and white plastic fork and spoon stuffed inside the napkin. These were put at each place setting around the tables. I was lucky to find a Halloween plastic skull treat container for 69 cents, which I cleaned out and filled with plastic grocery bags full, I then put gummi worms on the top. So it looked like worms were coming out of the top of the skull. The kids loved this!  This was placed on the table too, as well as bowls of chips and cheeses.

I had a 5-foot skeleton that I dressed like a pirate and placed a sign on it saying beware of pirates. I made this out of the top of a pizza box, and painted it black, with beware of in white and æpirates' in large red letters (I saw a plastic sign like this for $20.00, so I just copied it). We called him Billy Bones, he sat in a chair next to the present table. I had a bathtub box which I made a pirate ship out of. I cut one long side and one end off. The end that was cut off I sewed together with twine, so it came to a point, like a bow of a ship. I cut the sides so that it looked like there were rooms on the back. I took the extra cardboard and sewed it to the back and bent it over inside the ship, this was for the mast. I made the mast out of 8-foot and 4 foot pieces of dowel, tied with twine in a t shape. This went through the extra cardboard at the back so that it stood up by itself. I made a sail with left over white material and had it bunched up around the dowel. I also made a skull and cross bones flag out of black material and used white fabric paint for the skull. This took a bit of practice as I did it free hand! The ship was painted brown and I drew wooden planks across the ship with a black marker. The top back part of the ship was painted black and the windows were painted yellow and I painted blue waves at the bow. A door was cut in one side for the kids to get in. This took the better part of a day to do.

As Halloween was the next day, after the party, I sewed three pirate costumes for my children (a feat in itself, as I don't sew that well!). The pattern was McCall's m4952, which included white shirts, red and white stripped pants and skirts, a red felt vest, black sash, and black corsets. They were so adorable it was worth the effort. Of course a sane person would just buy them, but there wasn't matching ones in the sizes I needed. My husband and myself wore pirate costumes too (black pants, white shirts, and a red and white striped sash's). I made bandana's for everyone out of black satin type of material (cut large triangles and fold under the long side about 1 inch and sew. 1.2 meters makes 6 bandanas), I then used white fabric paint and made a skull and cross bones on the front part. After they were dry I hung them on a pants hanger, if you lay them flat they tend to stick together a bit. I also downloaded pirate songs from the Internet and had them playing continuously (Walt Disney's pirates of the Caribbean, wiggles and Muppets treasure island are some).

The party: As each child arrived they received a bandana and eye patch, and if they wanted I gave them a beard and moustache with Halloween make up. I let them play in the boat and eat the munchies until everyone arrive. Many of the kids came dressed up in pirate costumes, so it just added to the dTcor! Once everyone was there we played ôswab the poopdeckö; the children were divided into two groups, each got a mop. The object of the game was to mop a black water balloon (filled with air) across the room, around a pylon and back to the next person in line. Whichever team won, got to pick out their pirate tattoos first. So they all got tattoos. Make sure you have extra balloons blown up, as a few were broken during the came. The next game was walk the plank I took another large box, dismantled it, and cut out a long strip (about 1 foot by 8 feet), painted that brown and drew wood grain on it with black marker.  This was placed in front of the pirate ship; the child was blindfolded and turned around 6 times (or however old the birthday boy/girl was). Whoever made it to the end with out falling to the sharks  (one foot off counted as falling off) won a prize. I had plastic pirate hooks and a sheet of  pirate stickers for the girls as prizes, several kids won. In between games I let the kids run around and play so I wasn't rushed to start the next game, it was much more relaxed and fun for me! The last game was ôpass the captain's hat I had the children sit in a circle and pass my son's captain hat to pirate music, when the music stopped who ever was holding the hat got a plastic sword. They all promised to be careful with them, and no one was hurt in the sword fights following.

There was more free play until the food was served. Food: I served hot dogs in miniature pirate ships (I cut out brown boats with brown construction paper, you have to make folds like a cardboard box to get the shape, the flaps were then glued together. I then cut out small and large sails out of the yellow parchment paper and pierced them with a wooden skewer and shaped the paper so it looked like the wind was blowing the sails (small sail on top large one beneath). I made small Jolly Roger flags out of black construction paper and used white paint to paint the skull and cross bones on them. They were then pierced on the top of the skewer with the sails on it.) The hot dogs were put into the ships and the skewer was put into the hot dog, so they looked like pirate ships. They were served pop or juice, which we called grog.

Then we had cake and ice cream. I made two cakes for his party. One was a pirate hat (bake two 9inch round cakes, cut them in half width wise and then lengthwise, so you end up with 8 half moon shapes. Ice 4 of the half moons together and put them round side up. Take the remaining 4 halves and ice two sets together. Then cut out a rectangle out of each one. These go on either side of the half moon, short side facing the front (make sure they are the same depth as the round cakes), then take a serrated knife and cut the round cake sides to resemble a mantle clock (I hope you know what I mean!). Ice the whole cake with black icing (wilton's black icing color works best, it looks grey at first, but it does darken to black after a bit). Then take yellow icing and use your star tip and make a border all around the top rim of the cake (about a inch down). I then used the small circle tip and white icing and outlined a skull and cross bones on the front of the hat. And then used a bigger circle tip and filled it in, and finally I had a big white feather and I put it in the cake, off to one side.)

The second cake was a pirate ship. I baked one large rectangle cake, and two round cakes. Stack the round cakes on top of each other then cut width wise in half (actually make it off center a couple of inches) then on the rounded end cut some of so that it can stand up on its own. Use chocolate icing to stick all these layers together, then place this on the rectangle cake (small end down), this is the ship. I then scooped out the front part, a couple of inches down, to make the deck of the ship with cake railings. This was all iced in chocolate icing I used a knife to draw wooden planks on the outside of the ship. The rectangle cake was iced in blue. You can shape the icing to look like small waves. I took white icing and used my star tip to make white waves along the front and sides of the ship (in a sideways ? Mark shape). I put small plastic pirate figures, cannon and treasure chest on top of the ship (was a set at the dollar store), and I made a larger version of the sails and Jolly Roger flag and stuck this into the top of the cake. I must admit it turned out rather good! There was a lucky napkin and lucky ship (x marks the spot!). For which a plastic pirate figure set was given. Then it was time for Mackenzie to open his presents. I had each child get the present they brought and sit in a semi circle in front of the birthday boy. They took turns bringing their present up and then once it was opened the got a loot bag.

Loot bag: each child got to keep their bandana, eye patch and sword and I made a small loot bag with chocolate gold coins, skull ring, black telescope and skull and cross bones sucker (I used blow pop suckers because the wrappers were mostly white, I took white tissue paper a cut in to squares and wrapped the squares around the sucker part and took a black marker and drew a skeleton face on it. I cut out of white fun foam the crossed bones so that they were in the shape of a X, and this was glued to the back of the skeleton face.). I also made little thank you notes out of the tea stained parchment paper that hadö Captain Mackenzie's 6 th Birthday Party. Thanks fer the treasure me matey!ö there was a picture of a treasure chest in the middle. These were all put in clear plastic treat baggies. Once they were given out the kids just played until the parents picked them up. The party lasted 2 hours( and was months in the making!!!) This party took a lot of my time to do, because I was making for 34 kids, but if you only have a small party then this shouldn't take long at all! My advice is to start early, do a bit each weekend, and if your kids are older get them involved (they can do all of the cutting out). All of the loot bag items and prizes were bought at the dollar store. And using construction paper and discounted material make it more affordable.  All the little details make the difference between a nice party and one that will be talked about for the next year! All it takes is your imagination, and of course this Website! This is the first place I go to get ideas. I recommend it to all my friends when they ask how I come up with all my ideas. I hope some one gets inspired by some of my ideas!

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