5723

Scooby Doo -5yr- Cardboard Box Mystery Machine

Feb 2003

Jodi in Lebanon, PA

Special Mention

My daughter is OBSESSED with Scooby Doo, so she had a big Scooby party for her 5th birthday this weekend.  I went all out!  I bought alot of spooky things at Halloween when they went on clearance, such as bat rings, ghost lollipops, etc.  Instead of using treat bags, I got plastic ghost buckets - like the pumpkins you carry to trick or treat? - they were 25 cents each after Halloween.  I went to the thrift store and got a turtleneck sweater, and some knee socks at Walmart for $1 and dyed them orange, then made myself a pleated red skirt.  I drew freckles on my face, and got a pair of very thick black framed sunglasses from Walmart, popped out the lenses, and wore them so I could look like Velma.  The shoes were the best, I got them off of ebay, they had great ones at the thrift stores but I have huge feet so I paid a bit more for mine.  My daughter wore her purple dress, headband and tights, and I made her a green scarf out of a scrap piece of material so she could be Daphne. 

Invitations were made from parchment paper that I made myself - (a piece of printer paper, edges torn off, crumble up, flatten, lay on a cookie sheet, pour 1/2 cup of cold tea or coffee over it then soak for 5 minutes.  Blow dry. Then I stuck them carefully through the laser printer.  I put a picture of Scooby and Shaggy and put "Zoinks!  Arlena is turning FIVE!  She would like your help in solving "The Mystery of the Sholly Avenue Ghost".  Please bring all your mystery solving abilities to:  address -  then the date, time, etc) I wasn't sure if the post office would mail them if I rolled them up in paper towel tubes, so I just put them in a manilla envelope and marked it with red marker on the outside to look like a stamp, "Top Secret". 

I took a refrigerator box and cut out 2 rectangles to look like the ones on the mystery machine, painted them lime green, and wrote "Mystery Machine" on them in the funky orange letters.  With the left over cardboard, I made a bunch of orange flowers, stuck them all over my van with magnets.  The rectangles went over my windows so I just tied them to the rack on top of my van.  Then when the kids showed up, I took their picture at the wheel of "The Mystery Machine".  Let me just say, traffic was stopping outside my house! :) 

When the kids arrived, I opened the door saying "Jinkies!  It's Danielle!" or whoever it was.  Then I gave them a Scooby dog tag that I made out of green grosgrain ribbon - I cut out a diamond shape in blue craft foam, cut a smaller diamond out of yellow craft foam and glued it to the center.  Then I wrote the child's name in the middle with "Doo" after it (Georgia-Doo, Sydney-Doo, Kailey-Doo, etc..) I sewed the foam to the ribbon with just one stitch of embroidery floss and used self-stick velcro on the ends to hold it around their neck like a dog collar.   

We made a mystery for the kids to solve - they went into the kitchen and each made their own pizza, and while they were doing that, my husband hid the presents in the bathtub.  When I told the kids to go to the living room to open the presents, they found them gone.  I told them about the trouble-causing ghost, and got out a book and a clue fell out, that led them downstairs to the basement.  I used a lot of clue ideas that I found on the internet.  The first one was "There is a ghost in the downstairs room of play make him spill his guts and he'll show you the way". 

Then I made a ghost pinata out of a balloon, instead of painting him because the paper mache' is so bumpy, I just hung sheets of toilet paper all over him to give him a floaty effect.  The next clue was inside the pinata, that led them back to the kitchen to make a craft.  When they were led to the last room to do the Monster Mash, my husband took the presents back into the living room and covered himself with a sheet.  The last clue told them to go back to where they started, where they caught the "ghost" in the act of taking the presents and sticking them under his sheet.  They ripped the sheet off of him and they LOVED that they solved it.   

I let my daughter open her presents while we cleared off the craft things, then they came in the kitchen, ate their little pizzas, and then we had cake.  I made sugar cookies using a dog bone cookie cutter and put black and brown sprinkles on them.  I got a double dog bowl, they had their cake in one side of it and dog bone cookies in the other side.  I had painted their names on the dog bowls and put some little bones on either side - a q-tip worked great for the bones.  Just be sure to use a paint pen for their names because the acrylic paint will wash off after awhile. 

When the kids were done with their cake and cookies, they were begging me to do another mystery, they had SO much fun and were SO excited.  A picture of them in the mystery machine will be mailed to them with their thank-you card.  They all took home a ghost bucket filled with candy and scooby stickers, and also their dog bowl and dog collar.  This was the BEST party we ever had!  I'm dying to have another Scooby party for someone else so I can wear my Velma outfit again :)

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