Maya's 8th Birthday Party: Pajama-Rama

Maya decided on a pajama party (UN-sleepover) for her 8th birthday! It was nice to be back at home after a few Cottam parties "on location" lately. It was good old-fashioned fun!

We started out by making flower & feather hair clips (and I didn't take any pictures?!). The girls designed their creations and there were Moms standing by with glue guns to help put them together. They came up with some pretty extravagant stuff, that is for sure! And they snacked on popcorn and candy kabobs while they waited for everyone to be finished.

We tried to do a "photo booth" type thing, hanging a sheet up and setting out a box of hats, feather boas, etc. But it wasn't a big hit and we only ended up with a couple of shots...

And yes, I don't think we had the flash settings quite right! :) Oh well. This is only a few of the many girls who came over for a wild and crazy time that night.

We played a couple of games. First up: toilet paper race! Each girl had a partner and she tried to wrap her up with toilet paper as fast as she could. They had fun with it, though next time I'd give them a few tips to get them going. Of course, afterward it turned into a big toilet paper FIGHT, which was also fun.

We also did an "I have never" game where the girls wrote down something they've never done. I read them out and the girls who HAD done that thing had to put a gumball in their mouth. There were some big, nasty wads of gum after that game!Breakfast for dinner seemed like just the thing! Chris whipped up a huge stack o' pancakes, and we served bacon, scrambled eggs, fruit and juice. Yum!

After dinner, the girls brought the toilet paper fun outside! They toilet papered the trees and each other, and just generally ran around, dog-piled, laughed & were silly.

Then we brought the silliness back inside, this time for a sing-along dance party! I went onto YouTube and found karaoke-style versions of their favorites, made a playlist and voila, the girls sang at the top of their lungs! Eventually, it all erupted into a massive pillow fight...as all good pajama parties should!And finally, it was time to sing to the birthday girl. Have I mentioned how stoked I was about the cake?! I loved how it turned out. It's nice when things are remedial enough for even me! :) Watching this tutorial helped.

So another year, another party, and not enough pictures of some of my favorite party elements (Where are the candy kabobs?! They were so cute!). Not to worry, I had another party to throw for Maya the following week, after her baptism. That's up next...