Happy Birthday, Argh!

Thanks to Taobao, I got 12 sets of these for 3.8 rmb each! Here is my favorite 5 year old pirate!

Can't be a pirate without a sword fight...Austin kept insisting they needed swords and I could not think of a "safe" way to give 9 children swords...until I remembered we had these balloons. Perfect.

The cake...really not hard at all. Complete with gummy sharks in the dangerous waters.

What a family...led by Captain Austin Blackbeard...though we had such a funny face most of the night because he was worried about getting the black on things. I tried to get him to take it off but he refused.

My favorite part of the pirate ship cake was the "cannons" on the side.

This is supposed to be a picture of Austin opening his presents, but I just laugh each time I look at Bennett. What a goof.

Wow- several of Austin's friends went in together to give him a real, child-size guitar. He loved it of course. He will grow into it...yet another birthday with a musical instrument for Austin. Hmmm, how many instruments are now owned by our family? I don't even want to know.

No birthday is complete now with the "Veggie Tales violin" as Bennett has named the bass. We did sing "The Pirates who don't do anything" song and more veggie tales.

Not sure who is more excited about this teaching opportunity...Chris or Austin.

The pirate party is over and I am beat! It was a great party though with no "too much birthday" breakdowns. Well, I already stayed up too late to do this post...off to bed!