Star Wars Party -7yr- Wookie Cookies

My son is absolutely obsessed with Star Wars! He has been able to quote all six movies since the first time he saw them! He is now completely taken with the Clone Wars cartoon series. With that being said it was a no-brainer when coming up with the theme for this party. 

Invitations: The week before the party we sent an invitation to everyone in my son's class at school and to those in his Sunday School class at church. I made them on my computer using a clipart picture of Yoda with a cartoon chat balloon over his head saying, To Josh's 7th birthday party go you must." On the reverse side were all the party details in a trapezoid wordart shape (Microsoft Publisher is such a help!). Josh thought these were too funny!  

Decorations: I hung blue green orange and black streamers in the doorway and from the ceiling of our church fellowship hall. I purchased three Star Wars: Clone Wars tablecloths from WalMart for about $2.50 each. I also blew up several blue and silver balloons and set them outside the door to let folks know where to come when they arrived.

I made Padawan uniforms out of brown and khaki and placed them on each child's chair. These uniforms were a really simple no-sew idea. I took a flat twin sheet several times in half and in half again - and so on - until I was able to get 8 long and thin (about 6' x 3')pieces of fabric. I folded each of the eight pieces in half and cut a small neck hole in the middle and then on one side cut a 3-inch slit to make it easier to get the uniform off and on. I used the khaki bed sheet to make long thin belts to tie around the Padawan costumes. Guests got to put their costume on as they arrived and began their training. 

Activities: (1) Home Planet Creation/Personal Flying Saucers. Before Josh's friends arrived I laid out markers glitter glue sticks crayons and star stickers. I also stapled two paper plates together to make planets/flying saucers. The kids were each given one of these to decorate as either their home planet or a flying saucer. This helped with the staggered arrival of guests. Some of the kids made planets with similar names of those in the movies and on the cartoon - others made something completely original.

(2)Jedi Training Obstacle Course: This was another activity I prepared before the kids arrived using various things we already had. The obstacle course went in a straight line down the length of the space. I laid out kickboards (the kind used in the pool - I purchased about 20 last year at the end of summer for about $0.50 each) to mark the path the Padawan's are to take - construction paper markers or fun foam circles would work fine. I laid down 3 boards then had a limbo stick laid across a couple of boxes for the Padawans to either jump over or crawl under.

Then I laid down 3 more boards and placed a large easel covered in green gossamer fabric to make it look like Yoda's hut for the Padawans to crawl through - a box tunnel would do fine also. Three or four more boards were laid down and then I set up a hula hoop taped to two recreation cones so that it stood up - Padawans went through this by stepping lightly and were not supposed to crawl through on their hands and knees. Next a few more boards were followed by a few recreation cones that the Padawans "jogged" through before making one last big jump over a set of four small cones. We considered timing this event but chose not to because the kids had too much fun and we didn't want to spoil that with competition - 7 year old boys are way too competitive! The kids actually enjoyed this so much that we decided to alter the course a little bit by playing Padawan limbo with the limbo stick at the beginning! FUN!

(3)Blaster Training: Using pictures downloaded from the cartoon network Clone Wars site I printed out and taped up to the wall 7 pictures of Clone War villains. The kids then lined up behind the designated line and took turns using my son's various nerf darts to shoot at the villains. After everyone began to get really comfortable with that we made the game a little bit harder by adding a clone soldier mask with blacked out eyes as a blindfold. We reminded the Padawans that in addition to the physical training that Jedis have to go through that they also have to rely on the force when they can't see things. The second time through the kids had even more fun trying to figure out where the "bad guys" were. This was a nice spin on the traditional pin-the-tale-on-the-donkey.

(4)Build Your Own Light Saber: I purchased enough long glowstick necklaces (the kind you can get at events like the circus that you snap and they glow in the dark)from the Dollar Tree for each student to have one. Each Padawan was given one glowstick a sheet (about 6" by 4") of fun-foam with a sticky side and access to glitter/glow-in-the-dark stickers markers and sequins. To make the light sabers we removed the paper from the sticky side of the fun foam and placed one end of the glow stick flush with the end of the foam and roll - this will cover about 6" of the glow stick becoming the hilt. Then decorate! I think this was the kids favorite activity! Thankfully the sticks were super flimsy and couldn't do much damage because the kids then had to show off their light sabre skills!  

FOOD: After we finished making the light sabers I didn't think that the Padawans would ever calm down but the idea of food was certainly enticing! We had "Pizza the Hutt" pizza chewy chocolate chip cookies we called "Wookie Cookies" (because my son is not a big fan of cake) and Yoda Soda (lime sherbet with ginger ale - totally looks like swamp water - perfect for Yoda!!). Yummers! 

The last thing we did was open gifts just before Josh's Padawan friends went home. We really wanted to take the emphasis off receiving gifts and put it on having a fabulous time with friends! With this as the goal I'd say it was completely successful! Hope this is helpful in giving guidance to others in using the force - and many thanks to the others on this site who gave me ideas to jump off from!  "