How To Pull Off An {awesome} “Star Wars” Birthday Party

Our little man just turned six.

He is slightly excited about it.

Not only is he starting kindergarten in a couple of weeks, but this is the first year he had a full-on party with friends. [The past couple of years, we’ve been out of town visiting relatives and have had a “family party.”] It’s a big season in his sweet little life.

So once he nailed down a theme he wanted, I got in the crafty thrifty zone to try to pull off a wonderful celebration for him.

STAR WARS INVITATIONS

I started by DIYing my own version of this tiny prints invitation. [It was pretty simple: just a solid black background with dots and a couple of circles.] I found a couple of great Star Wars-esque fonts at 1001fonts.com, where I have found so many awesome free fonts over the years (“Star Jedi Hollow” and “Star Jedi”). I put my invite on a flash drive and took it along with my own cardstock to OfficeMax to have the invites printed on the cheap (about 25 cents per invitation).

DEATH STAR PINATA

I also surfed the internet and pinterest for ideas and inspiration. One great idea I found was painting a soccer ball pinata (which are easily found) to make it into a death star one. Genius.

A little grey paint and a sharpie, and we were in business! [You can see all the ideas I pinned over on my Star Wars party pinterest board.] It’s not quite perfect, but it did the trick for something the kids would spend approximately two-and-a-half seconds looking at before attempting to smash into smithereens.

Of course, even though it has rained almost every afternoon here this summer, I was still hoping the rain would hold off for the party. It didn’t. So my brilliant husband came to the rescue and solved the pinata dilemma: we suspended it between us on a long walking stick. I still cannot believe I armed child after child with a bat. Blindfolded. In my living room. As I stood well within striking distance.

But it all worked out, so no harm, no foul!

POOL NOODLE LIGHTSABERS

Another great idea I saw ages ago was this pool noodle light saber project. The cost on these was very low too, especially this time of year, when you can find pool noodles clearanced out. I already had the duct and electrical tapes on hand. And–bonus!–they double as great party favors! It was so easy to cut the noodles in half with a bread knife. Then I wrapped three strips of duct tape around one end to make the hilt. I added a little electrical tape strip and “button” to finish them…

…Or at least I thought they were finished until my nine-year-old pointed out a few more details that really should be added to make them more authentic. Yeah, I thought, the five- and six-year-old guests are really going to care... But I did it anyway. Oi. What are a few more pieces of electrical tape between friends?

DIY STORM TROOPER SHIRTS

We also grabbed a few t-shirt blanks from Michael’s craft store for my kids to wear at the party. I added an iron-on image I found on the internet (google “storm trooper,” find one you like, print out on transfer paper). Cost: under $10 for three shirts. I already had transfer paper on hand.

But Big Bro and Li’l Bro had other ideas: they wore their long underwear and leather belts for the perfect jedi look. [the mask was added later, a gift received at the party.]

Sis was down with my storm trooper tee, though… Not that she had much of a choice… But still. 🙂 Here she is at the party with a fellow mommy friend of mine.

STORM TROOPER BLAST GAME

Speaking of storm troopers, for the first party game, I had printed out two each of three storm trooper images I found online. I left the bottom of the cardstock to form a ring stand, then cut out the silhouette of the trooper. They worked out perfectly. Cost: free.

Then the kids lined up in two teams and had a three-bullet nerf mini gun each to shoot down their three storm troopers. [I put two lines of blue tape on the floor to help keep them in line. Is that totally the teacher in me coming out??] This game worked out great, and the kids really seemed to love it. cost for two mini nerf guns: $5.

PIN THE LIGHTSABER ON THE JEDI

Next, we moved on to Pin The Light Saber On The Jedi using one of Big Bro’s old posters we found rolled up under his bed. Again, I used google to find a light saber image, and just printed off several of them. I used a little blue tape labeled with each child’s name to keep track (and the blue tape didn’t harm big Bro’s poster, so he could have it back after the party). Cost: free!

ESCAPE FROM CARBONITE

Then there was the game that could have been great… maybe? I froze two action figures overnight, one each in two casserole dishes of blue food-colored water. Unfortunately, this game was a bit of a flop since the kids couldn’t even make a dent in the ice to rescue the person frozen in carbonite… This might have worked if I’d made the ice WAAAAAAAAAY thinner or if we were outside and could have made more of a mess adding warm water.

We moved on. 🙂

HAN’S ROLOS and WOOKIE COOKIES

I did have a few socks to the parents–you know the kids didn’t care a bit about these details, just that there was chocolate involved! I got the star wars image online, then added the wording in the fonts I’d found. I love the “Han’s Rolos” and “Wookie Cookies” (Little Debbie Star Crunches). Totally neither my idea, but gleaned happily from the internet…

YODA SODA

…as was this “Yoda Soda.” So fun! It’s just soda and lime sherbert.

Then the cake… Oh, the cake… I think I just hit a creative wall by this point and so the cake was a simple (but delicious) two-layer chocolate cake with an R2D2 action figure on top to make it en theme.

Okay, but to redeem myself, I did make these cute little lightsaber napkins. I cut silver cardstock sheets into four strips and wrapped them into rings, then secured with a strip of black electrical tape and added a black sharpie “button” to each. I slipped into each a green rolled napkin to complete the light saber look.