Last year for our children's 3rd and 4th birthdays we decided to combine and have one large party.  Our son was born in January 03 and daughter in February 04.  They both just love knights and princesses so we decided on a medievel theme. I found a website that showed you how to build a castle with refrigerator boxes (Mr. McGroovey's) and went to work creating the coolest play castle ever!  The invitations were a unique story about a knight and a princess (Once upon a time in a magical land where fairies, wizards, knights, kings, queens, princes, and princesses lived in peace with their magical creatures, there was a beautiful princess named Julia and a brave knight named Ian.  Julia and Ian lived in a mystical castle in the clouds with all their friends. One day as Julia and Ian were exploring the castle, uncovering its many secrets, they discovered a treasure chest filled with books. In one of the books they read a wonderful story about a Purple Dragon who once lived in the hills next to their castle.  The story revealed that the Purple Dragon LOVED birthday parties and went to every birthday party that was held in the land.  One day there was a birthday party for the great and powerful wizard William the Magnificent.  Now this was to be one of the grandest and most magical parties ever given! The entire land was buzzing with excitement about just how special this party was to be. However, the Purple Dragon did not receive an invitation! She waited and waited for her invitation to arrive, but alas it never came. Sad and crying, the Purple Dragon went into her cave in the hills and has never been seen since. The story continued on to say that the only way the Purple Dragon will emerge from her cave is if she is again invited to a special birthday party.When Julia and Ian finished reading the  incredible story of the Purple Dragon, they decided to embark on a quest to find this Magical Purple Dragon and invite her to their birthday party.  But Julia and Ian need your help! They need all their prince, princess, fairy, knight, and wizard friends to come along with them on their quest.  So please join Julia and Ian on:Saturday, January 20, 2007 at 10:00 am until 12:00 pm Please come in your costume of choice and join in the fun! Lunch will be served after we have found the dragon!). We are fortunate to have access to our church's fellowship hall for parties, so we had a very large room to set up the castle, eating tables, craft tables, game tables and storytelling area. When all the guests arrived I invited the parents to relax in the special adult" area where I had set up card tables with bowls of nuts and such along with a chess board dominoes and magnet games. The children(all in costums) played in the castle until all the guests arrived.  I then gathered them together for craft time where we made helmets for the knights and princess hats for the princesses (milk jugs cut to make a helmet with stickers and foam rolled into a cone with toulle for hats).  After craft time it was storytime where we re-read the invitation story and talked about our "quest".  We were also able to use the rest of the church building for our quest so the hallways and rooms were different parts of the quest.  I also had teenage friends to help out in costume at various stops along the way (our dragon was a youth who was wonderful and really got into character!). We began our quest in one of the Sunday school rooms that was filled with artificial trees and bushes and layed down carpet squares as a walkway. We entered the "dark forest" looking for the dragon's home then moved on to the narthex area where I had put down a blue blanket for a lake and two teen girls were dressed in medievel dresses. They were the "ladies of the lake" and they helped to guide us to the dragon's home. We ended up in the sanctuary where we have a "quiet room" in the back. The dragon was waiting for us in the "quiet room" crying.  The children ran to the dragon (dressed in all purple sweats with "scales" made out of paper plates stapled together attached to a hat and going down her back)and invited her to the party. She got up and we returned to the fellowship hall to have lunch. Lunch was just simple fruit salad peanut butter & jelly or cheese sandwiches with apple juice.  We then had cake which was a dragon shaped cake I had made. After cake and ice cream we played some more in the castle or with the various "game stations" around the room. I set up four stations in the room with puzzles coloring pages & crayons my son's castle and knight play sets and books so if a child did not want to play in the castle there was something for them to do.  We ended the day with party bags. We decided not to open presents at the party since there was so much going on and we had about 35 children we just felt it was too much for the kids. It was a great decision because both kids got home and crashed on the couch while we cleaned up and visited with relatives who had joined us. This party would be wonderful as a garden party as well but we live in the Northeast and January is bitter cold.    "