Around The Star Wars Universe -7yr- Boarding Passes

This is a different take on the Around the World party theme (but for 7 year old boys who are REALLY into Star Wars).  Instead of visiting different countries/continents, we decide to visit different planets in the Star Wars Universe. 

INVITATIONS: I cut out a Naboo Royal Starship image, and printed on it an invitation to a diplomatic mission visiting planets in the Republic.  I asked for no weapons and costumes since I thought they would distract from the games and activities. 

DECORATIONS: The kids arrived at Coruscant (living room) and were given boarding passes to a starship (Naboo Royal Starship to be precise).  The boarding passes were made with cardboard and hologram paper, with their names and lego star wars images (my son's name is Lukas, so on his boarding pass was Lukas Skywalker" with the lego star wars Luke image; his friend Owen was "Owen-Wan Kenobi" etc.). 

Since we live in a small house the living room always served as Coruscant/starship and the basement served as the different planets we visited. So the kids would start in the living room go to the basement to a planet/activity then back up to the living room while the basement gets set-up (5 min). The set-up time was used for setting up activities and not decorating.  The only decoration we had was in the living room were Star Wars vintage travel posters (see Steve Thomas Star Wars posters).

ACTIVIES/GAMES: We visited the following planets: Tatooine Hoth Kamino Dagobah Mustafar and Alderaan and did activities related to the characteristics of the planet.  In Tatooine (30mins) we had a pod race; the kids were divided into 2 teams and had to win parts from Watto by answering Star Wars trivia then had to build a pod racer (the main pod racer body was pre-built from a cardboard box kids had to add thrust cones engines etc.) The race was a relay race around the basement and everyone received a #1 gold medal (from Oriental Trading).  In Hoth (10-15mins) the kids had to be Wampas and ice-fish for food. 

The kids made fishing poles from sticks strings and magnets and fished in turned-over cardboard boxes for items paper-clipped with small treats (the items were mostly construction-paper-fish with the occasional construction-paper-limb).  In Kamino (10-15mins) the kids were divided into 2 teams and took turns in relay style shooting down clone troopers with nerf rocket lauchers.  Clone troopers were 30 half-filled water bottles wrapped with paper images of clone troopers. 

In Dagobah (30mins) the kids first built light sabers together then took turns running through an obstacle course while carrying a yoda stuffed animal in a back pack.  We used empty wrapping paper tubes ($1 from Dollarama but painstakingly collected throughout the year) and colored painters tape for light sabers. 

The obstacle course consisted of walking on a plank dodging boulders (garbage bags filled with balloons suspended from ceiling) using light saber to keep balloons from falling to the ground kicking down (or using the force like my son did) to knock down a wall (boxes piled on top of one another) to face Darth Vader (husband in black clothes and a Darth Vader mask) for the obligatory light saber duel. Each kid receives a Jedi course completion certificate and a mini light saber key chain (awesome product on Ebay - $2/each). 

PARTY SNACKS/CAKE: In Mustafar (10-20mins) we had snacks and birthday treats which were individual volcano ice cream desserts similar to the one from Rain Forest Café (I used a turn-over sugar cones with the ends cut off as the volcano drip red icing on top filled the inside with ice cream and had sparkle candles on top). The final planet on our trip around the galaxy was Alderaan.  When the kids got to the basement there was no Alderaan only a Death Star pinata and origami tie-fighters suspended from ceiling which the kids took turns striking. 

FAVORS: The kids returned to Coruscant and went to the planet gift shop where they received a set of post cards from the planets they visited and a t-shirt which I screen-printed with images of a pod-racer (Tatooine) an AT-AT (Hoth) x-wing fighter (Dagobah) tie-fighter (Mustafar) and republic symbol (Coruscant).  I screen-printed using stencils that I created from contact paper alternatively you could use iron-on transfers.  The boys loved the t-shirt and the party was a big hit. "