Shark Attack! Eli's 9th Birthday Party

Due to the sheer craziness of our June, we decided to have Eli's birthday party the Saturday before Memorial Day, which was also the day after school let out for summer. It seems kind of weird to have his party already done with, but it's also kind of nice in a way, too. 

I decided to do it easy-peasy this time, too.  I bought a party pack from THIS etsy shop. I was kind of in a hurry since I decided to do his party kind of last minute. This seemed like the way to go since it was all ready and had much of the "extras" I thought I wanted for his party. The shop owner was very easy to work with and made some great changes, but I probably wouldn't purchase a pack again because it was a little pricey to print and I didn't end up using all the different "extras". However, I loved the Shark Attack theme and it gave Eli's party an actual "theme" instead of just come on over and play in the water!

My plan was to have all kinds of water activities in the backyard so I borrowed one of those big, inflatable water slides from a friend and that was our only big activity. Except for a water balloon fight. Eli was insistent on a water balloon fight. I told him he had to fill up all his own water balloons if he wanted one. So he did. 

He also managed to convince his dad and the youth intern, Matt (who's living with us this summer), to help. He's pretty convincing that way. Or maybe it was because they knew I'd have other jobs for them to do if they weren't "helping" Eli. 

Since the party was in the middle of the afternoon, I just had lots of snacks for the kids to eat whenever they wanted. I had watermelon (which they ate by the buckets!), Sun Chips, colored popcorn, goldfish, pretzels, and water bottles. 

There are cups in the green bucket in the middle. It was super windy. I'm talking constant 30mph wind so the cups needed to be in something to keep them from blowing away. And all the party decorations had to be taped within an inch of their life. Even the surfboards that I made out of foam board. I'm pretty proud of them. It was just foam board that I cut out in the shape of a cardboard and duct tape for the stripes. If anybody ever needs blue and green foam board surf boards with big shark bites out of them, I've got a couple you can borrow!

Snapped a good photo of Eli and Brad before the party started. 

Eli invited all the boys from his class and some friends with church. We invited some girls, too, so Phoebe would have someone to play with. Like our neighbor, Kaylee. 

The slide was a big hit. 

But mostly the boys just ran around shooting each other with water guns. It was cRaZy! I wish I had told everyone to bring their water guns on the invite because that's what they did the entire time. It was intense. I'll let the photos speak for themselves. 

The girls mostly spent their time trying to stay out of the boys way!

Brad decided to do the water balloon fight right before cupcakes and ice cream. He had them all line up and play relay toss game and then threw balloons at them while they ran around. This worked out great until they ganged up on him and attacked him all at once. 

It was a great way to waste 2 hours of water balloon filling work in about 10 minutes.

I ordered the cupcakes from a local grocery store bakery. They matched the invite really well, but the icing was so dark it turned the kids' mouths a crazy shade of dark blue or green.

The sparkler 9 was a big hit. I just love this photo. :)

Everybody ran around like crazy people a little longer and then they all went home. It was one of the easiest party I've ever planned! :)

Happy (Early) Birthday Eli!