Howdy Cowboy! Happy birthday!

I have been doing theme parties for many years for my three sons.  This year, I asked Samuel what theme he wanted for his birthday party.  He said "Horse".  I explored having a party at the stables, but it was beyond our budget. 

I found a toy rental company Toys for Rent, which has mechanical ponies for rent.  After thinking through, I decided that doing a party incorporating a mechanical pony could be possible.  One thing led to another, and in the end, we had a "Cowboy"-themed party. 

My little cowboy!
I got the hat from a party shop.  We have the checked shirt.
And thanks to the Royal Rangers vest, the look is complete!

I always design my own invitation card.  It helps that there is a huge amount of resources on the internet.  I decided that adding a picture of the mechanical pony would entice the children to come.  It worked - the children were very excited :)

We integrated games into the overall theme - there were three stations - "Shoot-out", "Animal lasso", and "Pony-ride".  The children also had to "hunt down" some "bandits".

This was the "program sheet" which I did up.

I also did up a "Wanted" poster. I pasted the words "WANTED" and "REWARD" and pictures of bandits, onto a beige piece of paper. I burnt the paper along the edges, and it turned out beautifully.

The boys are looking at the "WANTED" poster.

We did the party outdoors, at two BBQ pits near our place.  Each of the pit comes with a Pavillion.  We did a recce the day before at the venue and located the suitable areas for the various games stations.

At the "Animal lasso" station, the children had to "catch" at least two (out of three) farm animals in order to earn a token. 

We used "Newwater" water bottles to represent the farm animals. Again, I found cute pictures of farm animals from the internet, and pasted them onto the water bottles.



Aren't these animals cute?

Coming out with a workable lasso proved to be quite a challenge. We experimented with many different designs before we settled on this one.  Edmund helped me to make the final product.

After the children have succeeded in looping the lasso around at least one bottle/animal, they were supposed to return to the starting point, and pull the animal slowly towards themselves.

We pasted three "X" on the floor to mark three levels of difficulty.  If the children were unable to catch from the furthest point, they were allowed to move forward to the next X. 


Zechariah was "catching" the animal! Kevin, Bryce (blocked by Samuel)
and Darlene were watching him.  Gabrielle was playing at the other side.
 

The children were great. When we first designed the game, we were not sure whether the children will find it too difficult and therefore give up, but they did not.  It was indeed quite a challenge for many of them but they perservered on, and many of them played this game again and again.

Nathan Willianto : First you aim...
Estelle (Celeste's sister) : Ok, let me open this up...

Nathan : Then you throw!
Estelle: Look, mummy!

Elkan helped me mann the "Animals Lasso" station.  He was really good at his job.  He is a natural in enforcing the rules of catching at least two animals and going back to the first point to pull the animals back. Some children attempted to pull the animals back from where they were instead of doing it from where they started from, but they failed to escape Elkan's watchful eyes. He was unwavering in imposing the conditions, stoic in the face of tears and tantrums. 


That's Andrea, Rayus and Jaden!
They were closely supervised by Elkan.

Elias helped to mann the "Shoot-out" station. We originally wanted to use toilet rolls as targets, but at the recce, we found the place soooooo windy, that we had to use wooden blocks.  The moral of the story - always do a recce.



Elias, all dressed up for the role. (He said the handkerchief was to protect him from sandstorm).
He was trying to instigate Nathan Low to shoot at the camera man.
Behind him were Jaden and Rayus (partially blocked). The boy in blue is Rayan.

Elias was indeed the right boy for the job.  Just before the party started, he came running to me, telling me that the wooden guns we have (which we bought from the night market in Malacca, some time back), were breaking and we would have to cancel the game.  I told him that there was no way we were going to remove this station, and that he would have to solve the problem. 

 

I said what I said not because I am an uncaring "boss" (although of course, at that time, I was really way too busy with other things to help him solve it). I said that because I was confident that he could solve it.

Indeed he did. He ran back home and brought all four of his "home-made" guns to supplement the wooden guns. The game went beautifully. What did I tell you? He is my capable little problem-solver.

 

Isaac, Reuben and Jaden's brother! They were using Elias' hand-made gun.

The third station was the "Pony-ride" station.  We had a good friend to help.  He was so into the role that some people asked whether he came along with the ponies!

The "horse trainer" was giving a token to Gabrielle!
(Behind her is Faith and Caleb!)

We got two ponies so the children could ride alongside each other,
or do a tad bit of racing, which some of them did :)
(This is Celestyn and Bryce).

 

The pony station was very popular.  Samuel loved it!



Apart from the three games stations, we also had some art and craft, which we housed in one of the two Pavillions. 

 

The children were supposed to start from there actually.  Upon arrival, they would collect a Sheriff's badge (I used double-sided tape so they could to stick it unto their shirt) and a "Sheriff's Licence".  The Sheriff's License would have their name and picture, which is actually a cartoon picture of a little cowboy/cowgirl.

 

We had another good friend who came to help.  She was very busy nearly all the time :)

Isaac and Jaden were picking pictures for their License!
Josiah had just arrived.  He was trying to pick his cowboy picture.

The children could choose from a variety of pictures of cowboy/cowgirls to represent themselves.  They could then choose a "building" and a "cactus" picture, which represented the building and "desert area" which they have "jurisdiction" over.

We were unable to print the "license" onto hard coloured paper.
So we printed it onto normal paper, and laminated it instead.

On the other side of the "License", they could paste other pictures e.g. cowboy boots, cowboy hat, horse, etc.

This is Elkan's License.  He did it after the party ended.
He pasted every single variety of object which we provided.

These pictures had to be redeemed by "tokens" which the children had to earn through participating in the three games stations. 

We also scattered pictures of bandits all over the event venue for the children to find (Elkan helped with this, as Elias was busy trying to solve the wooden gun problem for his station). 

You can run, but you can't hide!
(We placed the bandits early in the morning. 
We had to stop the cleaner from sweeping them away!)

Some children were very excited and they kept bringing bandits back to me.  Since I had hidden a limited number of them (about 25), I had to ask them to put them back!



Sharmaine was trying to redeem her picture.
Bryce had gotten his bandit! In fact, he caught many :)

After the children have "caught" the bandits, they were supposed to "put them in jail". We did it via a little optical illusion - an idea which we stole from a Science Centre activity. We had a picture of prison bars on one side, and the children would paste the bandit on the other side.  When you spin the picture forward and backward, quickly, the bandit would look as if it was behind bars! See the picture below!

This is what happens when you spin the card quickly.
The guy looks like he is in jail!
 

In line with the theme, the goody-bags were in the form of money bags (the goody bag included a pack of mamee noodles, a Kinderjoy, two balloons and a plastic farm animal).  I came up with the idea and did all the shopping. Edmund came up with the design. Both of us stayed up till 2am in the morning packing it, among other things...

LOCAL BANK OF SAMUEL CHOO
Established since 22 August 2006
Opening hours on 18 August 2012, 10 am to 12 noon

We had the food in the other Pavillion. At first no one was interested in the food...they were only keen on playing.  Later, things improved, thanks to the presence of mothers...

 

We had fried Bee Hoon, Egg Tarts, Paus, Fishballs and Watermelon.

Soon it was time to cut the cake.  We got a "Farm" themed cake from Prima Deli.



 

The children were really sweet. They sang a LONG happy birthday song for Samuel.  First, they sang it in English, then they sang it in Mandarin.  Finally, they sang "May the good Lord bless you, May the good Lord bless you, May the good Lord bless you, May the good Lord bless you".

The teachers at ZBK would be proud of them! :)


 The children were so fun to watch.  They are so playful!

Samuel was a really happy boy that day.  He had more than 20 friends who celebrated this special occasion with him. 

  

Hello girls! (Faith, Ruth, Beth :))

 



Samuel received lots of presents.
Thank you, dear friends!



Many people worked hard to make this party happen.  Besides our two good friends who helped us with the games and crafts, mum helped prepare some food and took care of the food Pavillion.  Sri, our helper spent many hours cutting the little pictures for the children's crafts.  Edmund helped in many miscellaneous matters, like making the license/goody bags, putting up the decorations, transporting things (and people!) and he even managed to download some music from a Western music radio station (Range Radio), so the party really had a western feel to it.  

 



Happy birthday Samuel! We love you so much! :)

I had so much fun.  It was wonderful because the weather was good, and being out in the open, with the sun and the wind and watching the children run around, laughing and playing was heavenly. 

I was especially proud of my two older boys, who "discharged their duties faithfully".  They were busy throughout, and did not get the chance to play at each others' station.  Elkan was also too big to sit on the pony, but they did not mind it.  They enjoyed themselves too.  Elias said that it was the best party we have ever done. What a priceless compliment :)