Party Details {Riley’s Fifth Birthday}

As I mentioned last Friday, Riley’s 5th birthday party took place at our house over the weekend. It was entirely Star Wars themed, and I had a lot of fun pulling everything together to make it special for my boy.

I created lots of the decorations in PicMonkey, including a new banner, subway art, centerpieces, and front door sign. I turned to Pinterest for some inspiration on the food and made a Star Wars tie-in label for everything I served. (That was not part of my original plan, but there were so many great ideas out there that I couldn’t help myself. And I loved the way Erin did the same thing with the food at Kate’s princess party.) And I made favor tags and typed up an updated birthday interview after chatting with Riley about his answers.

I also found a few things online that we printed out and hung up. Kenny created a whole Death Star battle scene on the wall in the entryway. The Lego Star Wars A-Z poster and pictures of a Lego TIE fighter and X-wing were on the dining room mirror. And I loved the Star Wars typography prints I put on the ledges in the dining rom. So cool.

But perhaps the best thing was the huge cardboard display of R2D2 I scored from our local grocery store. Remember when we first saw him hanging out in the pasta aisle? Well, I asked one of the managers if it was possible to have him when they were done with him, and she totally came through. R2 was the perfect vessel for our pool noodle lightsaber favors.

Then there was the cake. Riley of course wanted a Darth Vader cake, and once again, his daddy made his wish come true.

Grandma came over on Friday afternoon to help. I baked two double 13x9 vanilla cakes (four boxes of mix total), which Kenny stacked together with a layer of icing in the middle. Then he got to carving. He basically employed the same technique that he used in the sand when we were in Florida in June.

After carving was complete, they started the task of covering the entire cake in black icing. This was the year we discovered the secret to getting awesome-looking black icing: adding cocoa powder to the white base before adding the gel coloring. It made the icing taste more chocolatey, but it worked great. Meanwhile, I was making little TIE fighters out of Oreo thins, marshmallows, and melted white chocolate. Those were a hit. And so cute.

Right around midnight, long after I had gone to bed, Kenny and Grandma finally had their finished product. So very impressive. Even if all of that icing did stain everyone’s lips, teeth, and tongues black. (Which it totally did.) Together with the special birthday candle Lego display that I put together earlier that day, we had an awesome cake for a very special boy. Riley LOVED it.

Party recap is up next!