How to Throw an Easy Kid Party: Lego Style

Our youngest turns 5 this week, and yesterday we had his friends over to celebrate with a Lego party.

I honestly had ZERO intentions of blogging about it as of yesterday morning. I didn’t think anyone would be interested because I was doing SO LITTLE planning and it was SO not a crafty/Pinterest-worthy/awesome/spectacular birthday party.

And then it hit me.

This is why I SHOULD ABSOLUTELY BLOG ABOUT IT! I think we all need to ease up on ourselves about birthday parties. Everything you see everywhere is just so freaking adorable and clever, and you know what? Sometimes it’s OK to just have a bunch of kids over and stuff them with cake.

And guess what?

It was the most fun party my kids have had yet.

And here’s the secret:

Are you ready?

I mean, this is gonna knock your socks off.

Kids love to play.

I KNOW! You’re shocked.

But seriously. All those time consuming, super cute details that you see all over Pinterest – they’re totally adorable, and I think it’s absolutely fabulous if you do those for your kids’ parties, I truly do. You’re awesome. And I will be the first one to ooh and ahh at your skills. But I also know this:

There is a LOT to be said for a good ol’ fashioned drop-off party where you let the kids run wild and play.

Kids don’t care if the house is clean. (this is my favorite reason) 😉

They don’t care if you pinned 87,349 adorable crafty ideas and executed them ALL.

They don’t care if you stayed up late making perfectly frosted cupcakes – made with cake NOT FROM A BOX.

I know, I’m blowing your mind yet again, aren’t I?

I had thought about making a super planned, spectacular Lego party for our son.

I started browsing Pinterest for Lego party ideas.

In the end, I scratched most of that, and here’s how it went down.

A couple days before the party I checked my bin of leftover party supplies – I had a Banner, and a red tablecloth unopened – perfect. Just bought yellow plates and blue napkins.

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I started drawing faces on the plates with black Sharpie markers. Here’s where I realized I’ve REALLY let go of my perfectionist ways – my 6 and 7 year old wanted to make the faces. I handed them over and welcomed the help. I mean, really, big picture here, right?

They turned out pretty cute too:

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Not bad for 6, right?

Then I called on my little helpers again. I handed them some big mason jars and glass vases, and sent them off to fill up with the larger legos we own. This was our centerpiece, and I stuck some little balloons from the Dollar Tree in them. Done.

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As for the favors…we were in Ocean City last week, and my kids always love buying their block candy at their famous candy store (Candy Kitchen) so it hit me. I bought a pound and divided that into little baggies.

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I hung the Happy Birthday banner up in the entry, grabbed balloons that morning and decor was DONE.

(Did I mention I didn’t even need to clean?!)

Moving on to the party…

It was from 1-3. At first it was going to be 12-3, and we were going to do pizza and cake, then the church factor hit me, and realized 1pm would be better. So I took away the pizza element, making this even easier.

They came over, and were all just excited to be around each other, I let them play for a bit. Then we sat around the table for some snacks.

And by snacks, I mean Paul walked around with pretzel wheels, and I with a box of Goldfish dumping some on each plate. My mom will have a heart attack when she reads this, but we DIDN’T EVEN PUT THEM IN SERVING BOWLS. Oh man, she’s DY-ING. Oh, then we tossed juice pouches at them. Literally.

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After some in depth conversation on superheroes, we busted out the cupcakes. I went with my go-to: Devil’s Food with cream cheese icing. I added yellow food coloring to make them look like Legos, and attempted to make the Lego face with black icing. Let’s just say my cake decorating skills should be left to the professionals, but that’s the beauty of kids: they don’t care. It’s cake. And cake = GOOD.

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And know what’s awesome about cupcakes? No cutting or utensils of any sort! Blow out the candle and pass ’em around!

We headed in the family room for gifts, and the birthday boy made out like a bandit.

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When the noise level was JUST about to burst our eardrums, I yelled:

WHO WANTS TO GO PLAY OUTSIDE FOR SOME WATER FUN????

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH {Mass exodus out the front door}

I should note: A couple days before the party, my son said he wanted to do water balloons and water stuff at his party, so I sent out an email to everyone to have their kids wear suits under their clothes.

So outside we went, but before the water fun began, I did have ONE little game I thought would be fun to try: The Lego Spoon Race. All I had to do was get two spoons, three buckets, and a bunch of our legos out.

The kids set up in two teams, and raced with one lego on their spoon (we used the bigger kind, like in the centerpieces). Each team had one bucket filled with legos, and had to take one lego from their bucket to the bucket at the other side. First team to empty their bucket won. What did they win, you ask? Nothing. I was not that prepared.

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I couldn’t believe how much fun they all had with this game! We were sitting out last night with some neighbors, and they did it all over again! So cute to see the teams cheering each other on too.

Then, THE MOST FUN PART OF ALL…the water!

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Seriously – a pack of 100 water balloons at the Dollar Tree = ENDLESS ENTERTAINMENT. Ok, I guess not “endless” since eventually we went through the 100 of them, but still. It was a great run.

They came up with fun games, like walking backwards without dropping, tossing to each other, how high can they throw it, etc – it was so cute. And while I was at the Dollar Tree, I picked up 12 of these squirt toys and wrote their name on each one so every kid knew which was theirs, and a little something to take home too.

My husband got in on the fun, and grabbed the hose – it was 12 against one – and everyone had huge smiles on their faces as they attacked him with their squirters (we filled up the water table so they could continually fill ’em up).

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Before we knew it, it was 3pm and the parents showed up to take home their soaking wet kids.

A great time was had by all, and really, all I did was put out some snacks, round up some legos, take a quick trip to the Dollar Tree and make cupcakes.

When I tucked him in last night, my son said this was his favorite day.

Those of you who stress when it comes to throwing the perfect party, let this party be a lesson to you.

Kids don’t care if everything’s perfect. They just want to run around and play.

Cupcakes don’t hurt either.

(Even ones with messed up Lego faces).

Comments

  1. Lynn Haag says:

    Loved your post and helping us realize how easy it can be and as you mentioned, all they really want to do is play and have fun (messy house and all). When my daughter turned 9 this year we settled for a very small party (3 girlfriends) and wait til she’s 10 for the big party. All we did was head to our local water park and her dad & I sat back and watched 4 bff’s swim/play/chill for about 3 hours and they were THRILLED. Like you I kept thinking “wow, so easy”! Love it! Great job mom (and dad)!

  2. This is fantastic! My mom always did the simple parties and some of my friends still remember them. I love Pinterest but allow myself to stress out about things like this. I’m thinking that my little guy’s 4th birthday will be simple yet fun! 🙂
    The lego party looked great BTW!

  3. Lovely, lovely post. It’s so true. We just exhaust ourselves trying to have Pinterest perfection. But you’re right. Children love to play. And they absolutely don’t care about the details!

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