It's now the evening of September 14th, 2002 and I was just sitting here recapping the events of the day. Our son's 8th birthday party.  He chose an Army theme. I couldn't find much in the way of army type of decorations so I decided to use Red/White/Blue colors for the tableware and balloons.  I found cartoon type army pictures on Windows Publisher and printed them out to hang around the yard. The INVITATIONS read: Attention Troops! We are on a mission to celebrate private 1st Class, JR's 8th Birthday!  We instructed them to wear their camo and to be prepared to get dirty!  We allowed him to invite 12 of his friends, they all came!  Upon arrival, they all received rhinestoned American Flag dogtags, had their pictures taken individually and with the group, picked a ribbon out of the bag (red or blue) which was the team they'd be on for the day. Our CRAFT ACTIVITY was PAPER AIRPLANE RACES, which were printed up on either red or blue paper for the different teams and they had to fold up themselves, they stood in their lines and 2 by 2 raced their planes, the winner received a sticker star.  The 1st GAME we played was a POTATO SACK RACE, again they went 2 by 2 with the winner receiving a star.  We then moved on to the AGILITY COURSE which we planned around our swingset.  We had gotten 8 tires, lined them up - set our limbo set (from a previous party)on the lowest peg - tied a rope in place of the first swing ,they had to cross over the quicksand ship - walk the balance beam - climb the ladder - down the slide -  climb a rope - grab a flag - and go threw the tires again back to base camp. Fastest time won a star. We then took time for a dinner break (Hamburgers, hotdogs, corn on the cob, beans and all the trimmings).  After dinner we went back to the games. TARGET SHOOTING, we lined up plastic soldiers and they shot a cork gun getting as many down as they could.  Most down won a star. Then we had a GRENADE LAUNCH game. We stacked 5 gallon buckets to form a pyramid taking the tops off of 6 of them ( there were 12 all together) they threw their grenades at the targets to rack up the points. Again, most points won a star. The team that collected the most stars received a 1st Place Ribbon, the other team got 2nd Place Ribbons.  For a little twist we let our son open presents first and then we had cake. His cake was awesome with a tank and soldier and surrounded by mini flags and sparkler candles. We had a couple other games planned but at that point it was so late we let them free play and gave out their goody bags (red and blue lights sticks, paratroopers, army vehicles, soldiers, nitrosnaps, crunch bars, mini M&Ms, and push pops).  When the parents arrived to pick the kids up I gave them each a made up scrapbook page (for the pictures we had taken when they arrived) and a Certificate of Completion. It was a lot of fun! I'd do it all over again!