Minecraft Party for the Non-Minecraft Mom

Here it is, the Minecraft 5th Birthday.

Invitation:  I designed a sword, was able to print both sides on one sheet and then cut it out and glued it together..........took me a couple of episodes of Bones to cut them all out, so just be prepared.  I'm happy to email you the template if you want.  Just say so in the comments!

 

For the decorations, i kept it simple, green and black.  Only a dozen balloons.  I tried to use black tape on them to create a creeper face like I saw on Pinterest..........but.......the black tape is heavier than the helium can hold up.........so, green balloons it was.

Cake: J wanted a creeper cake.....square...hmm....I don't do fondant, so square cupcakes!  The pan is at Michael's.  It is also available on walmart, if you are willing to order it and wait (more planning required).  I just used different combinations of green food coloring to make different shades and then i got some of the black icing paste.  it came ok.

  

Food:  Hotdogs (cooked meat), chips (baked potato), carrots, (carrots), cheese cubes (gold), watermelon (Melon) and pretzels (sticks).  I printed off some labels that were of the minecraft foods, glued them to cardboard, attached them to plastic knives (because i always have a ton of extras of those) and then stuck them in little tubs of play dough leftover from Halloween.

For activities:

I made each kid a burlap pouch for their "inventory".  I also got those little acrylic jewels in clear (diamond), green (emeralds) and blue (lapis) and then i found some gold and silver (iron) painted rocks.  these were the rewards for completing each task.



Task 1 - get the ball in the buck.  Only we set the bucket in the center of the jungle gym.













Task 2 - Cross the lava.  I did the floating island team building activity with two 'islands' and some boards that weren't quite long enough on their own and they had to figure out how to get everyone safely across.

Task 3: Tightrope walking.  We strung up some tension cords between two trees and they had to get across it.

Task 4:  We created a spiderweb between two more trees and they had to get through it without touching the sides.  We used parra-cord.

Task 5:  They made TNT.  Small cans of plain seltzer water and mentos.  We had them circle a table and drop their mentos in the can one at a time.  They had a blast!

Then we just did cake and presents.

For favors, the kids I had made little sward pendants using those little plastic beads and mats and an iron.

Kids had a blast and i'm pretty sure i spent all of $50- $75 total.