Mario Party 3 & 7yr - Mario Bros Games and Fun

My two youngest boys both love all things Mario so for their combined 3rd and 7th birthdays we had a Mario Party party. 

INVITATION -  For my 7 year old's invitation I put the scene from Mario Party with all the characters at the top.  Below that I added the party info. Then at the bottom I made a dashed line across and put Can You Find The Hidden Pictures?".  I added pictures of individual party items (cake present etc) then added the same pictures hidden into the Mario Party scene at the top.  Then I printed them out folded in half closed with a star sticker and gluesticked a Mario star on top.  I wrote To:____ and From: Ben on either side of the star.  Since the few people (mainly family) invited for my 3 year old would also be invited for the 7 year old I just made an insert for his invitation.  I made it slightly smaller then half the size of the bigger invitation.  On it I cut and pasted his face to a picture of Mario flying on Yoshi.  Then I put "Yipee! Jake is turning 3! Then added the info below.  I printed and cut these out and slipped them into the bigger invitations. 

ARRIVAL ACTIVITY   I saved up a bunch of 2 liter bottles and covered them in plain white printer paper.   I cut out a slot for coins in each one.  Also I painted the caps four different colors to designate teams for our games.   The arrival activity was for the children to decorate their coin collectors.  I made little Mario overall pockets by cutting overall shapes (minus the legs) out of blue construction paper.  I cut the pocket shapes and glued on the bottom and two sides leaving the top open.  Then I glued down two yellow foam circles for buttons on each one.  Inside each one I put a foam lightning bolt and star that I had leftover from other parties.  I also printed out coloring sheets of different Mario items and cut out each item to put in the pockets.  I also cut out one of each Mario Party character so that each child could pick one.  That is the character they would be for the games.   

DECORATIONS  For decorations I mostly used leftover crepe paper balloons and cut out pictures of Mario characters that my children had drawn.  I also bought one bag of mixed balloons at the dollar store.    We have a big fish tank that sits empty on a bureau in my dining room.  For the party I covered the bottom with gravel. There was actually colored macaroni mixed in with the gravel (by my 3 year old).  It added nice color :)  I printed out two Koopa Troopas four Cheep Cheep fish a flying Koopa Troopa and a star.  I taped two strands of fishing line from one side of the fish tank to the other and taped the flying Koopa and fish so they were "floating" inside.  On the back of the fish tank I taped up the star and a set of three coin blocks that I drew on brown paper.  Then I stuck the two Koopa Troopas and all the characters for the coin collectors in the gravel so they were standing up.  On the top front of the fish tank I made a small sign that said "Pick One" with an arrow pointing down.   

Above the fish tank I hung a banner leftover from a firetruck birthday.  Between Happy and Birthday it had a framed circle with a picture of a firetruck.  I cut that circle out and pasted a piece of black with white stripes paper into the frame.  Then I made an oval on my computer with a  picture of Mario and Luigi on it added both boys names and little red 7's and green 3's all over and glued that on top of the b/w paper.  I had two round table covered with light green with darker green vines tablecloths.  On each one I put three little pots that I had painted green.  In the center of each one was a piranha plant.  I just made these from construction paper using a green k'nex toy for each stem.  I secured them with clay.  Besides the piranha plants there were craft supplies for the coin collector decorating.    On a wall beside the tables I made a Mario scene.  I put a brown with yellow and orange squiggly line border along the bottom of the wall.  Then I added a big vine on one side leading up to a row of clouds from one side to the other.  I wrote Happy Birthday Ben & Jake on the clouds.  I taped coins in a row above the clouds.  Above that I added two clouds with faces. Then I had three little rows of brick blocks. It was finished off with Goomba Mario Luigi Latiku pipes a fire flower mushroom and chain chomp all drawn by my two oldest boys.  

GAMES  I made a game board in my oldest sons room.  I  placed 4 different colored sheets of construction paper in a rectangle around his car table in the center of the room.  I made a big dice from posterboard.  In the middle of the table I placed a helium star balloon with eyes drawn on then added balloons and crepe paper around it.  On the wall I hung up a list of the 10 mini games we would play.   The color we landed on after each roll of the dice determined which team got to pick the game that we played.  All players received 1 coin for each game and the winning team members received a ticket too.  After each game two coins were also added into the group coin collector that I carried.  The object is to get 20 coins and earn a star. 

Mini Games -  These are all based on either Mario Party 5 or Mario Party 8 mini games. I used the original titles if you want to look any of them up.  Aim To Win -  We made our own version of a Filipino party game called pabitin.  I took two jump ropes and made a grid between them using yarn.  I did 5 pieces one way and two across.  Then I attatched 24 shorter pieces of yarn hanging down.  I had made 24 cards just drawn out on printer paper.  On each card was a Mario Party item (bitsize candy slowgo candy etc) and point value. I also added strips of streamers to hang down to make it harder/funner.  My husband and I held it way up and kind of swayed it back and forth.  Each child took a turn going under and grabbing two cards.  After everyone had their cards we had them separate them into + and - .  Then we added up each teams + cards and then subtracted the negative point cards from that.  The team with the most points left won. 

Paint Misbehavin'- I painted gumdrops to look like Goombas.  In a section of my yard I made a rectangle with pine straw.  In each corner of the rectangle I put a bowl of paint and an egg carton.  The object of the game is to grab one goomba at a time and dip it into your team's color of paint (I stuck toothpicks in the backs of the gumdrops so they wouldn't get paint on themselves).   The first team to fill their egg carton with 12 painted goombas wins. 

Shake It Up - In the real game everyone shakes up a can of soda to see which one shoots up the highest when they open them.  I used a Steve Spangler experiment called Gas Bags and just taped pictures of soda cans onto the front.  The experiment is a simple vinegar and baking soda mixup.  In snack size bags you add baking soda.  Inside those bags you put another bag with vinegar inside.  Both bags are sealed.  When you pop open the vinegar bag inside the baking soda bag and shake it up it poofs up.  The trick is some of the bags in our game had baking soda but some had flour.  Whichever team had the most "poof" bags was the winner. 

Breakneck Building - In this game you saw a log nail in some nails and paint a piece of wood.  For the logs I shaped clay and painted it brown.  The saws were butter knives. I did use real nails but I stuck them into a cardboard box that I had painted to look like a block of wood.  They nailed them in with toy hammers.  Then they painted rectangles of paper that I rolled a brown crayon across and drew wood grain with a crayon on with colored water.   I timed each team doing this.  The fastest team won. 

Bob-bombs Away - I found an empty box at walmart (they will give them to you) that had a high back and was slanted down.  I pulled the cardboard at the back out and made it slant down across the top.  I secured it with lots of tape and then covered it with construction paper.  I glued on a big Bob-bomb.  At the bottom I added another free container this one from big eggs at Easter time.  It had 8 little cups to hold the eggs.  You could also just tape a bunch of little jars cups or bowls together.  All across the slanted part of the box I stuck in thumb tacks.  Then I painted a ping pong ball black with eyes to be my Bob-bomb.  This game was like Plinko.  You dropped the ball down it bounces around between the thumbtacks and lands in one of the cups.  I painted numbers in each cup.  Everyone went three times the teams points were added up and of course the team with the most points won. 

Scaldin' Cauldron - I put four big bins on one side of our little pool table.  I drew cut out and taped on a picture of a big black cauldron onto each one (they were labeled ABC and D).  One member of each team climbed into one of the cauldrons.  I was on the other side of the pool table so I couldn't see who was in which one.  When they let me know they were ready I held a nerf gun with through the mouth of a Bowser mask (just a big printed face with hole cut out for the mouth) and shot a dart that I taped paper flames too at a chart beside me.  It was just a big piece of paper with 4 felt cauldrons labeled ABCD.  I shot two cauldrons each time.  Whoever was in the corresponding cauldrons was out.  We did this until only one team had any members left. 

At The Chomp Wash - In our carport I drew a bunch of chain chomps with chalk.  On each one I drew the four team colors blobs of "paint".   Everyone was given a small slightly damp sponge.   The first team to wash all their chomps one.  Chimp Chase - I made four different colored mama chimps and a basket to hang from each of their tails out of construction paper and taped them to the house.   Then I printed out small pictures of chimp capsules and colored them the four different colors with a marker.  When the game started I turned on a fan and threw the capsules in front of it.  The children ran to get their colored capsule and stick it onto the correct colored mama's basket (there were small x's on the baskets that I smeared with a gluestick right beforehand).  The first team to return all their babies won.  Rumble Fumble - I printed out Shy Guys and drew Bob-bombs.  There were 12 Shy Guys and 5 Bob-bombs.  I hid them under about 40 cups.  One member of each team would run to the middle and lift up cups until they found either a Shy Guy or a Bob-bomb.  If they found a Shy Guy they took it and put it in their teams container and tagged the next player to go in.  If they found a Bob-bomb they yelled "Boom!" left it there and tagged the next player.  I did also put lifesavers under some.  They could either take it yell "Yum!" and tag the next player or leave it there and continue till they found a Shy Guy or Bob-bomb.  After all 12 Shy Guys were found we counted and the team with the most won. 

Fish Sticks - I made Cheep Cheep fish from construction paper.  I started with a red circle and added features.  I glued them to little magnetic buttons with another undecorated red circle on the back.  I put the magnet not quite to the bottom so that I could kind of fold out the bottom of the fish to make them stand.  Then I took little plastic sticks and attatched ribbon which I tied around another magnetic button.  I drew cut out and glued on a picture of a bobber to both sides of the button.  I put these on a blue blanket I placed to look like a river.  They were blindfolded for this game turned around 3 times and then allowed to catch three fish.  There were numbers on the back of each fish for points and also one fish was painted gold and said "You get another turn." on the back.  Each teams points were added up and the team with the most won.  After all of the games they had earned a star.  I had originally planned on buying star shaped sand art containers and providing homemade sandy candy to fill them with but I was afraid it would take too long with all the games and it was not quite fitting with my budget.  They also have little star stationary sets that you can purchase at Oriental Trading company.  In the end though for this party I decided just paper stars were my best bet.  To make it fun I printed out Mario stars cut them out and wrote a number on the back of each one.  I found one of those magic bags at a garage sale for 10 cents (10 cents!).  There is a lever on the handle that you turn to open a secret compartment.  It even has a zipper on the bottom so you can stick your hand through and prove the bag is empty.  I put all the stars in the secret compartment.  Then I had the children come up one at a time to get their star.  When they reached in nothing was there so I said oh yes you need a coin.  I let them take a coin out of my container and set it on the handle.  Then I put one hand over the bag turned the lever with the other hand and yelled "Okee Dokee" (my boys' favorite Mario saying).  Then they could reach in and pick a star.  I also had gold star stickers that I gave them.  The numbers on the paper stars decided the order in which they got to spend their own gold coins. 

FAVORS  Instead of goody bags we had a candy store Shy Guy's Sugar Shack.  I had found the best free boxes at target.  They were red divided into 6 sections and said either wii or Nintendo DS on them.    I bought a package of yellow paper sacks and made labels for them with a picture of a Shy Guy that said Shy Guy's Sugar Shack.  I used candy leftover from other parties after holiday clearance and just whatever I found cheap. I put out little toy tweezers and mini ziplocs (from the jewelery/bead section) for the candies that were not individually wrapped.  As I said earlier the winners in the games received tickets as well as coins.  So in one of the boxes I put a sign that said These Candies - 1 Ticket each.   The rest of the coins had signs saying the name of the candy how many coins it cost and on some of them I did put a limit to make sure everyone was able to get at least one.  After everyone had a turn I gave them back their coins and let them shop again. 

Candies we had were -  Goomba Gum - little packets of Chiclets from the checkout at a mexican restaurant Toadette's Tarts - giant smarties with hearts on them from after valentine's clearance Blooper's Fish & Fish Food - bagged up two swedish fish with nerds sprinkled in Cheep Cheep Treats - gummy worms and lightning bugs Luigi's Licorice Mustaches - mini licorice sticks Latiku's Sour Balls - sour fruit candies Princess Daisy's Fun Dips - valentine Fun Dips on the to and from I wrote You with a heart for the o and Daisy with a daisy for the dot of the I Boo Pops - Blow pops with a Kleenex with Boo face tied over each one Bowser's Spikes - candy corn Princess Peach's Fruit Salad - I bought one package of peach rings and one of fruit slices cut them up and put them in lil baggies Bob-bomb's Butterscotch - glued lil bob-bomb's to the wrappers Baby Peach's Fruit Jewles - hard fruit candies Dry Bones' Bones - leftover Halloween bone candy Birdo's Eggs - jelly beans DK's Root Beer Barrels - root beer barrels Toad's Taffy - taffy with picture of Toad glued on  

PLACE SETTINGS  I cut out two big squares from posterboard painted yellow and painted on orange question marks to make question blocks.  I taped them to the front of two small square end tables that were on either side of the dresser with fish tank mentioned above.  On each table I  put place settings for 8.  Napkins - I bought solid blue napkins and made Mario star napkin rings for them.  I cut out strips of construction paper glued them into rings and glued on a star cut from yellow construction paper.  I added eyes with a black marker.  I rolled red forks inside the napkins.  Drinks - I made labels for Hugs drinks.  I put a picture of a Bob-bomb and made a burst with the words KA-POW Punch on it. I arranged the drinks around a small pot that was painted green.  In the middle of the pot was a k'nex stick with a Mario head on top (Luigi on the other table).  Around that were the straws.  I used striped red yellow green and blue straws.  I cut mustaches from black construction paper made two slits in them and put them on the straws. 

Plates - I cut two ovals from black plates and attatched those plates onto white plates.  This made Bob-bombs eyes.  I cut a top and wick from construction paper and glued them to the underside of the top of the plates.  My dining room table has blocks of green on it so I did not even use a tablecloth.  In the middle of the table I had two big green pots painted green.  They each had 2 2-liters which I had painted mushroom faces on the lids of.  In front of them was a small green pot with star glued onto the front.  It held the forks and sat on top of the napkins.  Along the front of the table I put white cups with Boo faces gluesticked on and plain red plates.  On each end of the table was a big box I had covered with white paper and decorated to look like the Mario Party dice.  One had 3 on the front and the other had 7 on the front. These boxes were placed over the cakes.  I put a black and white checked flag banner around the front and sides of the table.  I gluesticked mushrooms from coloring sheets onto it to make it more Mario. 

Cakes  For my 3 year olds cake I covered it in green frosting spiking it to look like grass.  Then I added a black fondant race track.  I made Yoshi and Donkey Kong in little cars to place on the track along with a banana peel turtle shell and block.  For my 7 year olds cake I cut an oval shape out of a regular rectangle cake.  It was iced blue with a brown border.  In the middle of the cake I used the top of a Big Top Cupcake cake to make Blooper (the squid).  I covered him in white fondant and added eyes (also fondant).  I also made a couple Cheep Cheep fish to stick in the "water" with him.  Then I made baby Mario Peach Luigi and Bowser from fondant.  I made each of them a little fishing pole using toothpicks with fishing line tied on and a little fondant bobber.  I put them around the edge of the cake.