Water Themed Birthday Party Games!

My son is a summer baby and every year for the past 5 years we have had amazing outdoor birthday parties and thankfully the weather has always held up!  Since Easter he has been planning this year’s party.  All he wanted was a BBQ, his buddies and a water fight – perfect for a July birthday!  The weather has been great so far this summer (for the most part anyway) but as it drew closer to his big day the weather forecast looked increasingly depressing – rain, rain and more rain was predicted.  I anxiously tracked the weather everyday on my phone hoping that the rain would not come!  Guess what – it didn’t – yaaaaaay!  We woke up early on the morning of the party to torrential rain but according to my weather app he said it would clear by 11.00am and it did!  As an aside, I made a Mincraft cake, from scratch for the big day and the cat ate it!!!!!  So I got up at 6.00am (usual time except for Saturdays!) to make another – was delighted with my masterpiece and then proceeded to forget all about it – we were having so much fun that I totally forgot to take the cake out.  Thankfully, we had a cake the day before on his real birthday so at least he got to blow out candles – a week on and I’m still very annoyed with myself for forgetting to take the cake out!!!!!!!

Unfortunately at least 4 of the invited kids had contracted Chicken Pox so were unable to attend the party but despite our reduced number we had a really great time.  The parents mingled on the patio, Mr G manned the BBQ and I, the big kid, happily organised all of the water games (I spent many a happy hour on Pinterest, scouring for water party ideas).  These are the ones we tried at the party!  (We also played many traditional party games which we have listed and explained in our Top 10 Party Games for Younger Kids).

Water Party Games:

1. Drip, drip, soak/dunk!: This is Duck, Duck, Goose, except with a wet sponge or cup of water – I found this idea on Parties 4 Me.
2. Waterballoon toss: we used our Little Tykes adjustable basket ball net (various heights for little people) and each child tried to toss their balloon into the net.  They got adventurous and took it in turns standing under the net waiting for the balloons to burst on top of them!!!!  We also set up a basin for Oodles (2y.o) and her buddies to throw their balloons into!
3. Water bucket relay:  We lined the kids up in two teams.  Each team had a small bucket.  About 100m away we had two basins placed on the ground.  The race started at the paddling pool, each child filled their bucket, ran up to basin, emptied bucket, ran back to team, next kid filled up their bucket and continued on until the basins were full!
4. Pass the giant waterballoon:  The kids made a large circle and I filled a normal balloon with lots of water to make a giant wobbly water balloon.  The kids then threw the ball to each other across the circle trying not to burst it – creates a huge splash when it bursts!
5. Water pistol battle: Each child brought their own water gun and I had bought a few extras in a discount store.  We had only one rule for the party, well actually two!  Number one was “only aim for below the waist with the soakers – no faces/heads”, number 2 was “have lot’s of fun”.  (I texted the parents ahead of the party to tell them that we were going to encourage the kids to only splash/aim for the other kids legs with the water pistols and balloons, especially as most of D’s friends were bringing along their younger siblings to play with O.  There was an all out battle with the water guns – everyone was soaked!
6. Waterballoons:  The night before the party I filled 150, yes, 150 waterballoons in preparation for the festivities.  I had to place a net over these for the start of the party as the kids were itching to get at them but we needed a few for some of the other activities.  Once they were let loose with them the real fun began!  They managed to throw and burst every single balloon in no time at all and thankfully some of the parents kindly filled a few more!  Our garden is still covered in little burst balloons.
7. Chilli’n in the paddling pool:  We had a small inflatable boat, several beach balls and other inflatable toys floating in the paddling pool and many of the children had alot of fun just hanging out, floating and splashing in the pool!
8. Waterslide: We placed our slide so that the bottom was in a small paddling pool and the little kiddies,especially, had a lot of fun going up and down our mini water slide!
9. What’s inside the giant ice cube? : We didn’t get around to this on the day, but D and O thoroughly enjoyed this activity a few days ago – you can see all the fun they had with it in our Giant Ice Cube post!
10. Pass the water cups down the line:  For this game, the kids lined up in two teams again.  The first person in each line is given a cup of water and they must pass it over their head to the teammate behind them continue down the line.  The last child empties it into a bucket.  The race continues until a team fills their bucket!

Thankfully each child had brought a towel and a change of clothes and these were all needed.  Once everyone had changed into something dry we had a lovely feast of burgers, sausages, chicken kebabs, fries, pasta salad, etc.  The party was a great success and D was delighted with the way it all went!  We were thoroughly exhausted following it even though it was only 2 hours long!!!

I have 100s of waterballoons left to fill (I haven’t told D and O about them)!  Let me know if you have any great ideas as to what we could use them for!  I have an art activity lined up for some of them next week, yes I am going to add paint to them and allow D and O to fire them in the garden onto a large sheet – looking forward to that, check back and see how we get on!  Would love to hear your ideas for the rest of them though!

Have fun

Ciara x

PS – Meet the birthday boy – this is a little tradition that we started a few years ago, on the eve of their birthdays we take a photo of them holding a sign.  We also do it at the beginning and end of each school year!

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