cate at 4

Oh, the difference a year can make. In a years time we went from all things pink and princessy to everything girl power dragony.

The theme this year was 'Astrid, How to Train your Dragon' planned mostly by Cate. She made up many of the games and made up most of the adventures for the Dragon Egg Hunt. I loved that she contributed so much in the way of imagination. That's exactly what I hoped she would do. The talking and and the planning, it's fun.

Here we go, then.

The cake and decorations. Notice the dragon pinata made out of a paper bag. In times past there was always difficulty whacking the thing open, so in order to make it easier I switched from paper mache to a bag. Well, didn't work. They still had a hard time breaking it open.


Donning their viking hats (made by Kenz) and decorating their shields. They also received their Dragon Training manual which consisted mostly of coloring pages. 4 year olds can't read:)


They played pin the teeth on toothless (Cate thought this one up) and feed the dragon using cardboard fish.

Then Brig led them in Dragon Training. They practiced their moves and had to fend off rocks (paper wads) thrown at them. At the end of Dragon Training they received a Dragon Training Survival Kit made up of: Shields (cookies), Rocks (marshmallows), Rock breakers (dum dum suckers), Spears (licorice), Wings (fruit slices), and Whips (gummi worms).


Next up, my favorite part. The Dragon Egg Hunt Adventure, wherein they had to follow the map to find the Dragon Nest.

They had to enter a dark and eery cave. Nope, no nest there.


Then they had to swim the river and watch out for the snapping crocodiles that bit them on the bum. Then jump in the viking ship and row, row to the next island.


Trek across the tall grass and avoid snakes until they came to the mountains. Climb the mountain (the stairs) until they came to the tallest one, an active volcano. Oh no, the volcano decided to erupt. Silly string spewed out everywhere.


This next part was scary and tricky. Had to pass the sleeping dragon. Even though they tiptoed quietly by that dragon woke up and tried to grab them. Oh, the squeals and screams. Little girls love dragons to scare them:) But once they got past they were led to the nest of individual dragon eggs hiding in the ottoman. Their paper mache eggs contained candy including candy lipstick because even if you are a dragon warrior you still like girly stuff:)


Cate with her dragon egg. Her face says it all. Totally worth all the cardboard.