Sarah's 5th

Sarah has been so excited for her 5th birthday. 

She can't wait to go to kindergarten next year, and some how she was convinced that once she turned 5 she'd be taller, smarter and just... different.

I felt kind of bad the week before her birthday. I hadn't planned anything for her birthday.

So...we threw together a little party.

Luckily she IS only five... and thought it was an amazing party (even though... not so much)

Sooo... with a couple of "late" nights.
This is what we pulled together for her.

I've seen this idea in various ways. I would have loved to have balloons hanging from the ceiling... helium filled and just EVERYWHERE... but the lack of prep time...

we got 70 blown up balloons shoved in her room.

She still thought it was pretty cool.

We took Sarah to get donuts and chocolate milk at Giant Eagle (our local grocery chain store) 

and then dropped her off at preschool. 

Then my sweet friend Joan (Emery's mom) took Sarah home after preschool and kept her until the party so I could have the whole afternoon to get it ready (which I really needed... I was so unprepared).

Anywho... around 5pm, these cute girls were here and ready to go.

We did a camping themed birthday party.

I'll confess... the idea was sparked by a pinterest post I saw.
I'm so glad I stumbled upon it.

It was so much fun. 

I found a pattern for these camping satchels and the girls LOVED them!

(main culprit for an all nighter)

After the girls got their empty satchels they, of course, had to fill them up. 

So they went on a scavenger to find their camping supplies.

These clues were stapled to brown bags and hidden around the house.

I would have taken a picture of them... but I barely finished making them five minutes before the party and had to run around and hid them.

Don't laugh too hard (I do) but here are my little clues with pictures...

Sarah liked them, so I'm posting them for her to see later.

Ignore my lack of art skills and my sloppy handwriting. 

I was down to the wire! 

So... after they ran around the house they had their camping supplies.

A flashlight, bottle of water, survival snacks, adventure journal and pen. 

The very last clue led them to this...

The camping tent.

This was special because it was where G'ma Newey would tell them an imagination story. 

So the girls all laid down and listened to G'ma Newey on speaker phone as she told a story about the girls on an adventure where they ventured in the forest and stumbled upon a magic door. Brave Emery tested the door out and let the rest know it was okay to go through. On the other side they saw giant boulders... and trolls who like to eat little girls. So the girls took off their socks and put them on the trolls tongues so the trolls couldn't eat the girls.
I'm not quite sure if this was exactly what the story was... but it is what the girls told me it was about while we were eating cake and ice cream.

Shining their flashlights.

  

After their imagination story it was time to get ready to roast hot dogs over the fire.

While daddy went out and built a real fire... the girls and I made a campfire for our cake.

(I had planned to decorate it myself... but ran out of time and made the girls do it instead, I think they thought it was fun)

Here are the girls smashing up graham crackers for the dirt.

Ew... our yucky dirt on the cake.

The girls then laid down some embers (reese's pieces) and fire logs (pirouettes).

Didn't they do such a cute job!

After we were finished so was the real campfire.

Thank you Ryan!

Only, after Ry's hard work to get the fire stoked... it started to rain. 

So it was more like a smoke pit.

There wasn't enough heat to cook our hot dogs. 

Luckily we have a gas stove... and moved the party back inside.

We had marshmallows too... but both Emery and Sarah just wanted to eat the mallow plain.

Eva was the only one who wanted to make a real s'more.

On to the presents!

Heavy, heavy hang over thy poor head...

What do you wish with a...

{"BONK"} bump on your head.

 (although during Abby's turn she just bonked Sarah's head through out the whole song)

She thought it was so fun!

I even made Ryan pose for a picture.

(and as a result he made me do the same)

I love watching Sarah open presents. 

She is still at that fun age where she gets totally excited about EVERYTHING!

We sang her a birthday song...

ate cake and ice cream and then the party was over.

What a simple, FUN night.

We followed it up with webcamming with each grandma.

Perfect end for a {somewhat} perfect birthday!

Happy 5th Birthday Sarah!

We. Love. YOU!