The Last Splash- an outdoor summer party

The sad, but exciting time had come for us to say goodbye to our first house and move away from family and friends to a new town. A new town and a new house to make a home. However, being the sentimental type that I am, it was hard to leave this house. At one time this was the "perfect" house for us and we were so excited to find it and then call it our home. We brought all our children home from the hospital to this house, had many great parties and celebrated many holidays here with family and friends. So it was only right that we said good bye with one final BIG party...The Last Splash.

When I first began planning this party I knew right away I wanted a big water slide! This was the BIG attraction that I kept secret from everyone. Note: if this is something you are considering renting for your party, I highly recommend paying extra for the company to set up and take down! These things are extremely heavy and hard to roll back up. However, it was so fun and worth it in my opinion. Kids and adults had a weekend of fun on this! It was the highlight of the party and as one of my best friends put it, "we knew you had something big planned but pulling up the street and seeing this and the look on the kid's faces..you have really outdone yourself". A fun party with all our family and friends is all I wanted, and we certainly got it!

One of my guys wasn't so sure about this at first!

After the first time, they lined right back up for more

Because the main attraction was pricey we kept the rest of the party fairly simple. A few snacks, drinks, and the use of our outdoor toys and some of our neighbors kept everyone happy for hours.

However, I did incorporate the "messy play" theme to this outdoor party with:

 Shaving Cream Slip n' Slide

Homemade Obleck and homemade side walk paint 

 

Obleck recipe: 1 cup corn starch

                  1/2 cup water

                  food coloring 

Side walk paint recipe: 1 cup of corn starch

                           1 cup of water

                          food coloring

I mixed the corn starch and water first then put into muffin pans where I added a few squirts of food coloring to the individual cups. Dollar Tree paintbrushes were used to paint the driveway.

I also made a batch of chocolate pudding that the kids used to paint a large piece of paper I taped onto the driveway.

Water tables, digging for bugs in the sand box full of dirt, a kiddie pool full of blue shark balloons for kids to pop, a giant G-Bop ball you can climb inside and roll around the yard in (this is one of our favorite outdoor toys!), and a temporary tattoo station run by my sister were also available.

Kids everywhere!

hmmm, which tattoo to pick?

Since we also had a fairly large number of babies/toddlers I set up a designated area for them marked with a "little kids:" sign. The Little Tykes bounce house was blown up, a kiddie pool, the DIY water blob (click on my Fun in the Sun Party to see more on the water blob) and blankets laid out with toys. In all the craziness I forgot to get pictures of this area.

I also planned a couple group activities. We had an obstacle course where the kids had to walk the plank, jump in the hoops laid on the ground, crawl through the tunnel, weave in and out of cones and finally jump in a kiddie pool of shaving cream to find a flag (if you grew up in the 80's and watched Nickelodeon you know what I am talking about ;). The shaving cream was from the Dollar Tree and I bought a dollar banner and just cut the pennants off for the flags. Again, I didn't get any pictures of the kids going through the obstacle course, but I did get a couple of them finding the flags.

end of the obstacle course

The water balloon "toss" turned into a free for all water balloon fight but that was okay! The smiles and squeals of delight were worth it!

I just love this picture. After running around and playing these hungry boys devoured what was left of the food!

In the end, I would say we went out with a bang! The Last Splash was another successful party; the rain held off, we all had fun, and I will always cherish the memories of our time in that house, in the neighborhood, and in one of my favorite cities with some of my favorite people.

To see more of my party ideas, home decorating, favorite recipes, twin activities x 2, and all things
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