Chandler's 5th Bird-day

Five. Years. Old. I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around that. It seems like just yesterday I gave birth to my precious baby boy and then I blinked; the next thing I know he's five. I grow prouder of him with each passing day. Here are just a few of my favorite traits about our little Chan*Man:

• He's sensitive to the needs of others
• He is very well mannered
• He has a wonderful sense of humor; quick and full of wit
• He's smart, imaginative, clever, and enjoys learning
• He is the BEST big brother; the love & kindness he shows to his little brother and sister melts my heart.
• He makes our jobs as parents ridiculously easy. He is such a good listener and thrives on being the best boy he can be.

He chose to have an Angry Birds themed Birthday Party this year. He had a whopping 36 friends attend. It was crazy chaos but a lot of fun.

I created the invitations using Publisher. (The one below is scanned which is why it looks so off color.)

If you want to make one of your own, here is the back ground I used: Just right click on it and save it to your pictures and then upload it to Publisher.

I put colored feathers from JoAnn's Fabric in the envelopes and also included a note which read:

"In lieu of gifts, we are asking guests to bring $5. Chandler will be giving half of the money he receives to a charity of his choosing. We will then match the other half and he will use that money to purchase something special for his Birthday. Thank you for your help in teaching our son the importance of giving."

We gave Chandler the choice between having a traditional Birthday party or the option above and he chose the charity idea without hesitation. Again, my heart bursts with pride over him. My family and I are very involved with the Relay For Life and my Mom is a cancer survivor; therefore Chandler has a personal connection to it. He chose The Relay For Life as his charity and is excited to be giving them $75.

Now, on to the party:
I used plastic table cloths to decorate the awning above our patio and hung Angry Bird balloons from them. To get the FREE printable Angry Birds template to make your own balloons click Here.

The sign hanging on the swing set reads: "Angry Bird House." At the bottom of the slide we set up boxes and green balls which we drew pig faces on with a sharpie. (We bought the balls at Wal-Mart if you're looking for some for your own party. ) I had big big plans to wrap or spray paint the boxes so they looked a little less like trash but I ran out of time. My Mom originally set the boxes up perfectly to resemble the game but the wind and children destroyed them before I could get a picture. Of course, the kids couldn't have cared less how the boxes were set up or how they looked; they were just excited to pretend to be Angry Birds and slide into them.

Here goes the Birthday boy!!

Chandler with his buddy Kaison.

The sign in this picture is also hard to read (& by hard I mean impossible.) It says "Angry Bird Cage." Inside of the trampoline we had green balloons with pig faces drawn on them for the kids to jump and tackle. They also played a game called "Break the Angry Birds Egg." One kid lyed in the middle with his knees up to his chest pretending to be the egg. The others jumped around him trying to "break" the egg by getting him to let go of his legs.

I found the idea for this HERE. Just cut squares of green tissue paper, wad them up, and glue them onto a piece of cardboard. A simple, fun project to have your child do. We hung this guy on the gate leading into our backyard.

We filled the gift bags (from Zuchers Party Store) with colored feathers, an Angry Bird tattoo, toy, chocolate eggs, crayons and an Angry Birds coloring sheet. The free printable coloring page can be found Here.

We topped off the evening  by coloring Angry Birds Easter eggs:

Happy Birthday Chan*Chan! We are so blessed to be your parents!