Happy Noon Year!

Last year, I saw on my cousin Becky's blog that she had taken her kids to a local "Noon Year's Eve" party. It was a party that celebrated the new year at noon instead of midnight, geared for younger kids who don't (shouldn't) stay up that late. I remember thinking how great that sounded and how I wished our community had a similar event.

As New Year's Eve rolled around this year, I thought about that idea and figured that our playgroup could pull off a Noon Year's Eve party. My fellow mommy friends agreed, and so we did it! We had a small turnout that day, but our little group had a memorable time, I think.

Before the party, Jaden and Cody helped me make a large 2015 decoration. Each number featured a different art medium (torn paper, dot painters, markers, and paint). They seemed to have fun doing it, as they willingly made all 4 numbers in the same morning.

When our guests arrived, we took pictures by this photo wall. I found some free downloadable photo props that I thought were so cute! I was actually surprised that Jaden and Cody got into this activity. They wanted to pose with every single prop.

Kenzie's glasses (below) say 2015.

She was the only one to successfully hold 2 props at once!

Even our littlest guests, Hannah and Wes, posed for a picture.

After we were all photo-ed out, we started our party activities. These were done in a countdown format. Before the party started, I had decorated 8 paper bags with clocks and stuck an activity slip inside each one. As the clock struck the time shown on the bag (or at least fairly close to that time...), the kids would open the bag to discover our next event. I had also seen this idea done with balloons, but I figured that balloon-popping would be too frightening for our age-range of guests.

Even though we were off on timing for quite a few of the events, the kids of course didn't notice! The bag-opening helped to transition from one event to the next, and it built excitement for the kiddos too.

The first activity was at 10:00-- snacktime! Ruth prepared a fun frosted jello and brought crackers too.

Hannah and Wes were particularly pleased about the second snack!

While the kids were eating, I read them a Winnie-the-Pooh New Year's story. It was a fairly cute story. The animals all think that they're stuck in December forever when they see it's the last page of their calendar. They end up writing a poem, celebrating all the months of the year and mourning the good-bye. Thankfully, Christopher Robin saves the day and tells the animals that the new year brings a whole new set of months. It's a reason to celebrate! :) Jaden and Cody LOVED this book. We read it many times following the party.

Jaden opened the bag for our next activity...

...crafts! Samie brought along supplies to make noisemakers. The kids enjoyed coloring their trumpets and using plenty of stickers, too.

It was SUCH a treat to have two dads join us for this playdate!! Jason had an extra vacation day for the year that he took advantage of this day. I loved having his help with the activities and the boys! Tom (Abbie and Hannah's dad) came along too, since he didn't have to teach. The men took charge of the baby-watching while the women guided the craft-making.

Here are the kiddos, attempting to blow their New Year's trumpets. Cody and Jaden obviously have no idea what they're doing. I love Kenzie's face as she's looking over at them!

I didn't get any action photos of our next activity-- a candy cane hunt. Jason, however, did a great job of hiding over a dozen candy canes in creative spots around our house. The kids found them all fairly quickly.

Then, it was on to New Year's BINGO. Jason ran this event too. He held up picture cards (depicting things like a noisemaker, party hat, or balloon) for the kids to find.

Jaden and Cody surprised me by really liking the game. They were very proud when they discovered a picture that matched Daddy's card. It was a successful first Bingo experience. None of the kids really understood the five-in-a-row concept, so we basically just played blackout. :)

Next, we had a mini-science experiment and watched "fireworks" explode in a jar. (just food coloring and oil poured into warm water) It was a very brief activity, but fairly impressive.

One of our last activities was filling out New Year's Eve reflection pages. Each family sat down together to discuss favorites and memories of 2014. The website where I found this form suggested sticking the completed page in your Christmas decoration box, where it'd be easily uncovered the following year. Great idea!

Cody and Jaden demonstrated to us how they love to live in-the-moment. Probably 3 of their favorites of the entire year mentioned something to do with "playing Bingo"! :) 

When everyone was done, we all shared some of our favorites of the year with each other.

Right before our countdown celebration, we made mini-pizzas with English muffins for lunch. The pizzas were conveniently cooking while we went downstairs to do the countdown.

The countdown went entirely too fast, so I didn't get great pictures. But, this activity was certainly full of noise and action! First, we gave the kiddos party hats and noisemakers. Then, we displayed a YouTube countdown video on our TV for the kids to watch. (The video I used only counted down from 10. If I repeat the party next year, I'm definitely doing a minute-long countdown. We need a bit more anticipation build-up!)

When the "Happy Noon Year" finally arrived, Jason was in charge of pulling the balloon-drop drawstring. This was a GREAT idea I found on Pinterest that was super easy to do. It simply used a cheap tablecloth, cut in 2, and then threaded together again with yarn. You fill the tablecloth with TONS of balloons (thankfully I had a balloon air-pump) and then duct tape the tablecloth to the ceiling. It worked like a charm! What fun to have tons of balloons fall on your head!

What a celebration! Happy "Noon" Year!

God's blessings on your 2015!