Let the Madness Begin {Noah is 9}

It's officially March.

And in our house, March means two important things...
1.   March Madness
2.  Noah's Birthday

So this year, the final year before our boy hits double digits, we merged these two important things together to celebrate Noah's 9th birthday with a March Madness theme!

I thought last year might be the year we gave up themed parties for Noah, but was surprised when he desired otherwise.

So I felt fairly confident that this would be the year he "grew up" and left those themed tables behind.

Wrong again.

He came up with his own theme and even planned how I should decorate the table... with a plate and a cup specific to each party guest's favorite basketball team!

He is most definitely my son!

So, of course, I indulged.

 

He invited 5 boys, but we were lucky in that 2 of them chose KU as their favorite team.  So we ended up with 4 different teams being represented...

 

I purchased a pennant for each guest's favorite team.  These served double duty as ceiling decorations as well as take home party favors.

The other take home party favors were water bottles in each guest's favorite team and a color-coded box of candy filled with basketball chocolate balls and other colored candy.

To make sure the "March Madness" theme was represented, I made stickers for the table and party favors, as well as tags for the drinks.

Since their is absolutely no question as to where the birthday boy's loyalties lie, the table centerpiece had to represent KU! We used his team-signed ball and special Jayhawk banners to round out the party table decor.

Since the party officially started at 2 pm and didn't end until after Mass at noon the following day, we had to feed these boys a lot!  There was pizza, pop, popcorn, donuts, and cake.  Lots of cake!

In addition to the chocolate basketball court cake, Noah requested two different kinds of cake balls... red velvet Jayhawks and white basketballs.  

The last year his cake will represent single digits.  How did that happen?!

All of the sugar, combined with sleepover excitement, led to many, many hours of this kind of silly behavior!

Overall, these kids were crazy and had a great time.  And as exhausted as I was, it was worth it to see my boy genuinely laughing and having a great time with his buddies...we rarely see this kind of smile anymore and so it's extra great when we do see it!

Happy 9th Birthday, Noah!