My oldest decided that he wanted a cat themed 8th birthday party. I tried to convince him otherwise thinking that it would be really hard to come up with party favors and games suitable for boys his age. Everything is always Hello Kitty! Once I gave up on changing his mind, I was able to think of some fun games and the kids had a blast. When they first arrived, they chose a set of cat ears that I made with felt and a hot glue gun. I was able to find animal print headbands even so I didn’t need to cover them! And I drew whiskers on their cheeks with an eyeliner. Then they made cats out of FIMO clay and I threw them in the toaster oven to harden. I didn’t get any pictures of those without children’s faces showing.

Then we went on a mouse hunt. I got these freakishly real looking mice and hid about 18 of them in really hard to find places. They hunted and found the more obvious mice and then I started giving clues. I had numbered each mouse on the tail before hiding them and had a list with their locations so I knew which were still missing. The kids begged to bring their mice home to hide in their siblings’ and parents’ beds to spook them.

Next up, each child chose a yarn ball. I bought Styrofoam balls and wrapped them with yarn leftover from my brief sock knitting phase in college.

They took turns racing them across the floor to the finish line using only their noses. This game was so much fun that we played two rounds. It was hysterical too. I laughed the whole time.
Then we opened gifts. We always play musical chairs for gift opening time. Whoever can’t find a seat gets to give the birthday boy their present and receive their goodie bag. We played to the tune of “The Cat Came Back.” I made super quick draw string bags out of a blue cat print I found at JoAnns. It was perfect.

Then I prepared lunch while my husband made balloon animal cats for each child. I bought the balloons and printed off some instructions from the internet and asked if he would be in charge of this activity and he agreed. I think he has gone overboard. Not only did he make a dozen or more cats, he also made me a balloon flower bouquet.
It was a very fun day!