Allie is 7!!! It's a Scooby Thing

This year Allie really wanted a Scooby mystery party, so in the beginning, Aimee volunteered to be the phantom. It became clear to me that Allie and Aimee both were thinking a little differently than I was in the planning. Rather than solve the mystery of who is the phantom, we focused on finding the GIFTS that the BIRTHDAY PHANTOM stole.
We made our own invitations since the party store only had the ones with scooby alone--we wanted the whole gang. (The gang was centered, but for some reason, I can't figure out how to get it all transferred right to the blog...whatever, you get the idea. Mounted on green or yellow card stock...the inside had the party details and asked them to help us solve a mystery.)

As everyone was arriving, we made secret code decoder wheel wrist bands, using the secret code wheel template on marthastewart.com. (cardstock, sticky back velcro, ribbon)

Next we decided to have cake and open presents, so we rushed back in to the entry where everyone had piled their gifts into a basket. The gifts were gone...in their place was a note. (all clues had the Scooby gang on the front, clue on the back)

The secret codes ended up being a little tricky. We had parents helping and Alex and Aimee on hand to help out. So, using their decoder wheels, we read: "OOPS! The ghosts were hungry and ate your clue! Find the ghosts."(This is the only pic of the ghosts...an hour before the party; table covered in clue-making supplies. Eventually, those ghosts got strings and the phantom took them all outside on the patio while we were solving the clue.)

This first clue led us to our first game, STOMP THE GHOSTS. White balloons with ghost faces drawn on held our next clue... in pieces inside some of them. After stomping and popping them all, we pieced together the next clue.
"Scooby and Shaggy are always hungry. Feed Scooby and you'll get your next clue."
This led us to SCOOBY SNACKS (or pin the bone on scooby)

After Scooby was all fed, we found the next clue behind the Scooby poster. Since this message was in a different code, Velma had left us some decoder cards, "Jinkies, it's a good thing I come prepared." (These cards are the standard tic-tac-toe/x code, also on the Martha Stewart site.)

The Clue:
"Have fun getting all wrapped up." Mummy relay was quite fun. Although we could have been clearer about how much they had to wrap each other up, they had fun just running!

Since they didn't actually use all the toilet paper, they had a hard time finding this next clue. Perhaps it could be slid into the middle so that it falls out and they simply can't miss it.
"Scooby and Shaggy will eat almost anything, but even those two don't want to be left holding the stinky socks." They ran back to Allie's room to play "Hot Socks" (hot potato).

Inside the socks was the next clue sending them outside to dance. "Even Silly Phantoms love dancing! Of you'll play Freeze Dance the best that you can, you'll get your last clue!"

The phantom tossed their last clue in over the fence. I don't actually know what this clue said because it was the last clue to be written, and it was written 5 minutes after everyone got there. I told Alex and Aimee to decide where the gifts were going to be hidden (the bathtub) and write something down for the last clue. I believe it said something about where you get clean...
They succeeded in finding them, and we FINALLY got to open gifts and have cake.

Our weather was beautiful, but just the light breeze wouldn't let the candles stay lit...we pretended to blow them out anyway.

Since I already posted some of these pics on facebook, my Aunt Tana asked about the white cake, "was it mystery flavor?" Actually, no. It was initially going to be a magnifying glass with a question mark inside. I totally ran out of time before the party, so I frosted it and considered leaving it white. But Allie was still wanting to do t he question mark, especially since I didn't let her help much (or any) on the Mystery Machine cake and promised she could help more on the next one. She held me to it, and got to draw her question mark on the cake.

For a large part of the party, Aimee was the photographer. As I scrolled through the pictures, I ended up seeing jillions of opening presents. This girl opened each one very carefully and took forever, I guess!

After cake and ice cream, they loved just playing together.

They took all left with a treat bag of Scooby Gummy Snacks, Ghost Suckers, punch balloon, scooby bones (snack size kit kat), animal pencil, animal slap bracelet, and flower erasers.

This easel message was left by one of her friends.

The After-Party...these girls know how to PARTY!!! LOL
These snacks weren't eaten at all during the party. If the kids had stayed longer and played afterward, they might have, but we were running around pretty much non-stop. We had homemade chex mix, muddy buddies, and popcorn. Allie made labels for them which identified them as
"Chex Mix"
"Mudy-buddy from the glop Monster!!!!!! Oh-no!"
"Popcorn of Green-Goblin!!!! Scooby-doo"

We had tons of fun! I love you Allie!!