Turning a "Whole Hand"- A Medieval Birthday

I will admit that I had a ball putting together Miles 5th birthday party.  It was a lot of fun.  My hope is that the memory will last a life time.  I am thankful for Pinterest which allowed me to gather a barrage of ideas.  You can find my Medieval Birthday Board HERE to see the many ideas that I found.  We did a lot of dragon related activities, because Miles enjoys dragons.  We invited the children to dress up in medieval themed costumes and I had a basket of things that kiddos could borrow if they didn't come suited.  The theme worked out beautifully since it was a boy/ girl party.  I made Miles and Chris Knight tunics and myself a dress for the event.

It was super simple, I sewed it with the Surger in under an hour.  (I do wish that I had used gold thread, so it looked like it was trimmed in gold.)  

So here is what we did.

I made crowns for all of the children as favors and decorated with books from the library.

This is the cake I made the directions are on the Pinterest Link above.

The children had Sward Fighting practice.  The balloons in the trees were the enemy knights to fight.  We made the swords out of half of a pool noodle with duct tape for the hilt.

I had pre- cut out shields and made duct tape loops on the back that could be used to hold them.  The children decorate their own shields.  

I asked people to pose with the cardboard flames with the intention of printing these out for the thank you's instead I used boring store bought ones.  But at least the pictures are cool.  

The children played "Pin the Fire on the Dragon"

They "Sleighed" the dragon pinata.  

The children went on a dragon hunt to find their very own pet dragon.

The children had to "save the damsel in distress" by going across the bridge, jump the river, crawl through the dark cave, and then run around the tree three times to go through the dark forest to then save the damsel (Barbie) under the laundry basket.  

We fed the kiddos Rosted Hog (Hot Dogs), Swords (Carrot sticks), and Dragon Scales (Doritos).  Then we had the dragon cake.  

Rather than having favor bags the children created their favors along the way and left that day with a sword, shield, pet dragon, and crown.  I have been told by some of the parents that these props have sparked play experiences as home since the party which was exactly my hope.  A memory to last a lifetime.