Hunter's Surprise Spy Birthday Party!!

surprised boys.... we had kept it a secret from Nate, too.

So I had the idea to to a spy themed birthday party, and when I mention it to Ben, he just took off with it and we had the best time planning it!  Here Ben is acting as the CIA director.  Each boy had received an invitation with a code name .. Agent Brown, (or another one of 8 colors) and a passphrase.  The passphrase was in code that they had to figure out.  Oh, and they had to wear the color of their name when they arrived at headquarters.  I wish I had taken a picture of the invitations, but I didn't!

The boys traveled to different "countries" (rooms labled) in the house, and got clues to follow the trail of double agent.  Here the boys had gone to Hong Kong, and someone at a restaurant had recorded two men having a conversation in Russian.  Nathan has my phone with the recording on it (thanks, Papa!) and he's going to have it translated.  Ben had made several web pages that would seem like translations, etc.  He had to pick the language and then play the recording into the microphone.  Then the translation popped up!

The attic was Italy, and the hit a dead-end there as the agent that was supposed to have the "ring" was dead.  We did a duct tape outline on the floor for that.

Happy Birthday!

making a wish

eating cake! 

waiting for parents to arrive

Here's the sandbox that we put in a few weeks back.  It's also the site of the "rings" that the boys finally had all the clues to find.  We hid 8 ring pops burried in it for them to dig up.

Here's the notes they took as they got each clue.

This was the first thing they found.  It was a travel bag packed with clothes and such that the double agent had left in a secret hideout.  The boys searched it and found a note in his wallet in the pants pocket, from Russia to him saying  to go to Germany for further instructions with the ring, and for him to drop the control panel off at Brazil with another agent.

Here's the "safety deposit" box that held the control panel.  It was found at a bank in Sweden.  They overheard the rogue agent say the combination as he made the deposit. 

Another shot of our dead agent.

He was so excited about the presents the boys gave him!

Each boy had their own color passport.  They did a self portrait, and then in each country a stamp was hidden that they had to find, and then stamp it in their passport.  At the end, they realized that the stamps spelled out where the ring was hidden....  S.A.N.D.B.O.X.

We love you, Hunter!



Growing Crystals was one of his gifts.  He was thrilled!



We got helium balloons for each boy in their color, and of course got an extra pink one for Felicity!  Check out those dimples!  I love it!