It has taken me all summer to find the time to upload my pictures, and actually post about my cute Chad's 5th Birthday SHARK party! I figured no better time than now, since it is shark week of course! I can't believe it was 5 year ago since my little Chad made his presence in the world. 5 years goes faster than I ever imagined it would. I had a great friend tell me that she allows BIG birthday parties for important birthday milestones. So she does a birthday for the years they turn 5, 8, 12, 16, and 18. The other years are set aside for family and a few friends. SO I decided to try this ... and so far, it has been GREAT! I saw a few years ago on a friends blog, her little boys "shark" party. With Chad's birthday being a summer birthday ... I knew that this was the party that I wanted to throw for Chad's 5th. We started off with the invitation search ... and luckily ... my favorite invitation and invitation, card, and stationary company PEAR TREE GREETINGS had just the right touches for our party! The front acts as a shark mask, and the back as the invitation. (I can't tell you how many mom's told me that their child played with the mask for days)! We ordered the invitations, and then saw that there was PARTY DECOR, and THANK YOU NOTES!! It was the perfect touch for the perfect 5 year old party!! We started off the party, by giving each child a shark visor. Then played fish, fish, shark (aka ... duck, duck, goose) while we waited for all the little sharks to show up. We invited 18 little ones to the party, and to our surprise ... we had 18 kids show up!! I luckily have the most darling babysitters that love kids, and they came to my rescue ... because, lets be honest, me and 18 kids would not be easily tempered! ha ha Then we opened the garage, and played pin the fin on the shark, and hit a really great shark piñata, in the garage of course! Next was the back yard for some cake and treats! Again, I got to use all the darling decorations I got from PEAR TREE GREETINGS. I used some of the printed circles, and stuck them on kabob sticks for cake toppers! Followed by some gift opening. ***NOTE: when you get 18 gifts, I would suggest you do what I did. Let your child pick out a few of their favorites, and play with those first. Then when they aren't looking, put the others in a closet, and bring out one when they get board. It has been a summer of entertainment, and he has enjoyed playing with each gift, rather than them getting lost in the shuffle of everything! Our next activity was a slip and slide and a sprinkler that my sister got Chad for his birthday. t shot up balls and the kids loved it. As the kids were worn out, sugared out, and super tired ... we ended with a fishing station, (SADLY, I was so busy running the station, I didn't get one picture!) They got their grab bags of treats (the candy from the piñata, and a bag of fish bate!) It was certainly a fabulous party, for a fabulous 5 year old. It wouldn't have been as amazing without all the cute decor, stickers, invites, and everything from PEAR TREE GREETINGS. Be sure to grab your Shark decor for your kids party here!