Happy 6th Birthday Jackson!

Jackson turned 6 at the beginning of this month during his winter break from school. We decided to hold off on his birthday party until school started up again, so that he could invite all of his kindergarten friends.

He had asked for a Grinch/Dinosaur/Star Wars Birthday party. How in the world was I supposed to put THAT together?? Christmas was a HUGE dinosaur event for him, so we convinced him that maybe it would be OK try something different. On his actual birthday we brought a Grinch cake (photos to come) to my parents home and watched the Grinch movie with them. So that left me with a much more manageable Star Wars themed kid party.

Jeff was definitely more excited about it than Jackson. He had been trolling E-bay for several weeks before the big day picking out the perfect gifts. He found a vintage Rancor Monster and keeper as well as a newer Millennium Falcon ship that was unopened and in perfect condition.

This is the invite that I made for Jackson to pass out at school. All those years of designing Star Wars board short paid off!


The week before the party was a particularly hard week for me. In addition to trying to get the kids back on schedule for school, my knitting class started up again for a spring term, and I was bidding on and ultimately won a large freelance gig. The party went on the back burner. I was very tempted to cancel the whole thing, but knew that was impossible. So, after a quick trip to Party City, Target, and Michaels, then a 9pm run to the grocery store the night before, I was FINALLY able to START the party prep for an 11:30am party.

We had the idea that it would be a fun challenge to make a Millennium Falcon cake. Making the cakes for the kids parties is my FAVORITE part of the party planning process. When I "grow up," I secretly want to work for Duff at Charm City Cakes in Baltimore. Mikey and I are Ace of Cakes Junkie's. Jeff found a picture of a Millennium Falcon cake that Duff had made online, and I thought it would be a fun challenge. I decided that I was going to start when I got back from the store, and not go to sleep until the cake was done. At 3am I was able to put down my piping bag and crash for the night.

Not bad, considering that I didn't use fondant (and wouldn't know how anyway)! I used gray cream cheese frosting over double fudge cake. The gray circles are Necco wafers. The lights are cut up fruit roll-ups, and the shading was done with some awesome black food-coloring spray that Jeff found. I'm going to post step-by step photos at some point, in case anyone out their in cyber land wants to give it a try someday too.

Jeff had found some mini Star Wars figures to place around the ship, and we pilfered the machine gun from Jackson's present.

The next morning came VERY fast. The bounce house guys showed up 2 hours early - just as I was crawling out of bed. Jeff was wonderful and had stayed up cleaning the house as I was baking and decorating the cake. In the morning we had to set up chairs, hang streamers and balloons, throw snacks in bowls, pick up a GIGANTIC 36" pizza, and we were ready to roll.


After the kids got a little worn out from bouncing in the bounce-house, eating pizza and drinking Yoda Soda and Dark Side Floats, we had a meteor hunt. I told the kids that there was a meteor shower and I needed all of the young Jedi Knights to come and find all of the valuable meteorites. I told them that it might be dangerous, so they needed to select some weapons for protection.

I made sure there were plenty of pink squirt guns for the little girls.

I think the adults were a bit jealous that I didn't hand any out to them!

It was such a beautiful day that it felt like we were having an easter egg hunt in the middle of June and not January. Kinda trippy to think that a few short weeks before we were sledding in the foothills and celebrating Christmas. You gotta love L.A.!

The meteors were filled width planet bouncy balls, UFO yo-yos, alien toys and star bracelets for the girls.

Some of our favorite new friends from Jacksons school came. This is Caden and his mom Jennifer. She is on the school councils with Jeff and I, and we think she and her kids are great.

This is Anthony and his mom. Anthony and Jackson have been best friends since the 3rd day of school. The first few days didn't go so well since Jackson "narked" out Anthony for splashing toilet water in the boys bathroom. After that they became fast friends. Unfortunately a month into school their class was divided up, and Jax and Anthony were separated. They have done a good job of hanging out at recess and lunch though.

I was quite surprised at how many school friends DIDN'T r.s.v.p. for Jackson's party. I had no idea how many kids (and parents) to plan for. It turns out that only 2 kids from his school came, and that was because we already knew their parents and they had committed to coming early on. Hopefully by next year, we will have gotten to know more families, and he'll have a better turn out.

It was great to have his tried and true local friends and cousins fill in the ranks, and it ended up being the perfect size party. He was happy that his favorite school friends came, and I think that distracted him from how many didn't.

After the meteor hunt we played stick the chest-plate on Vader. Jackson was almost dead on. I double and triple checked that blind fold. I guess he just used the force!

Then it was time to take a crack at Vader's helmet. I had wanted Jeff to dress up in his Vader costume to hold the pinata, but besides the fact that he never wants to be seen in that skin-tight nylon costume in the daylight, we were worried that the mini Jedis might get carried away with the bat and strike-out at their mortal enemy.

Caden shredded the helmut with a well aimed blow and separated the mask from the helmet. It made a great hat.

Jackson blew out the candles, and I was sick about having to cut the cake. It ended up tasting great, and we had plenty of leftovers. True to form, Jax was MUCH more interested in playing with the action figures than eating the cake.

We were able to hang out with our friends for a few more hours before heading up to little Alabama's 2nd birthday party up the block. When we got back, Uncle Al came over that night to help us polish off some more cake and pizza. Despite the exhaustion, it was a wonderful day and the kids had a blast. We are thankful to everyone that helped celebrate Jackson's special day!