Jakes Bithday - Phase 2 of 4

So Phase 2 of Jake's birthday was his "friends" party. We had this at our house on Saturday. Jake made out the guest list, picked the snacks, drinks and desserts, and if you can't tell from the photos, made out the party agenda as well.

We played a backyard game of football, until, boys being boys, it got too rough and we had to move to a pass catching drill (that's Greg @ defensive back). One quick note on the too rough stuff; I supervised this portion of the party (Marisa got the duck-duck-goose section), and I was prepared for it. My poor wife did not understand that 8 - 5 to 7 year old boys in one location (away from school) is the one and only true recipe for barely contained chaos and anarchy. They yell, they scream, they fight, and if someone doesn't get hurt, it's a miracle worthy of note. Anyway, my point was, all of Jake's friends (ALL, not MOST) are bigger than he is. Even when of the big kids didn't want to play football because it was too rough, Jake was at the bottom of the pile, hands on the football every time. The poor kid got killed by all of the bigger kids, but hung in there and took a beating. Okay...proud Dad moment #1 over.

All of the kids were given the opportunity to paint their faces and put on tatoos for all of the games. Jake and Tanner both had a blast painting their faces and we have enough paint left that I am sure they will have it on in their easter pictures and 4th of July photos etc. There were football and baseball cards galore for goodie bags and sports stickers as well.

As Jake does not like cake (that he didn't inherit from me, I singlehandedly polished off Faithy's cake). He picked ice cream sundaes with BSU colored sprinkles for his dessert. This was followed by candy once the pinata was broken (that's my boy in the Tom Brady jersey and the BSU hat!).

Then there were inside games; duck-duck-goose, bowling, and an electronic football passing game up in the boys room, followed by more general chaos until everyone left. I think that all of the kids had a good time and that the party was an overall success. Jake got more footballs, baseballs and BSU stuff for gifts. The weather held which was great, it was supposed to rain/snow, but we were able to play outside and preserve some of Marisa's sanity...