Pirate Party for a 5 year old

My soon to be 5 year old son wants a ''Pirate Party'' does anyone have any suggestions on hiring a non-expensive Pirate? Also, one that is Male and not Female? When I showed him some of the pirates I have found he said to me that he knew that there were girl pirates but, he really wants a boy. One idea that I had was that since my Sons B-day is the day after Halloween ... maybe Daddy could be the Pirate but, if we go this route any suggestions on what he should ''do'' for entertainment? Thanks In Advance for Suggestions! Plannin' A Party Mommy & Daddy

6-year-old wants a treasure hunt birthday party

Help! My son, who is turning 6, wants a treasure hunt birthday party. I have no idea how to figure out the hunt, or make up clues, or come up with prizes. I'm imagination-challenged. Does anyone have treasure hunt ideas or supplies I can use - such as clues, rules, ideas for how to run the hunt, ways to make it fun for the kids and not too much work for the party- giver or parents? Thanks!! Treasure Hunt Challenged

For his 8th birthday, I did a similar thing, although by this time we were in a small house. I wrote a series of clues in very rhymed quatrains (with the benefit of self-discovery: it's very easy for me to write very bad poetry). The final treasure in the dryer, was a bunch of those whistling tubes you can either blow through or swing around to make a noise. Again, the kids just loved this.

The kids just adore these hunts and are surprisingly adept at working out clues. I often thought I was being too obscure, but they got the clue very quickly every time. The clues can say things like: look for three trees together, look for the bench in the middle of the park, look under the wooden rabbit on the piano, whatever.

Good luck on your party. Dianna

For a hunt: you start out by handing the kids a piece of paper with a clue on it. It doesn't have to rhyme, and you can take photos or draw pictures of the hiding places instead if the kids can't read or you want them to do it all theemselves. But it's fun if you can rhyme the clues. Some we just used are: ''Mommy loves to bake us cakes; she mixes day and night. Go to where she keeps her bowls--can you get it right?'' There was another clue tucked inside one of our mixuing bowls. Another one : ''Our little baby brother likes to sleep a lot; go to where he takes his naps--that's the next secret spot!'' (clue was in the baby's crib).

For 6 year olds, I would have at least 5 and no more than 10 clues, and at the end there should be a little gift for each kid (at my 5 year old daughter's birthday party we had little boxes with a hair band inside each--each wrapped in fancy paper.)

Another treasure-type idea (to do outdoors): get a cardboard box, and cover it or color it to look like a treasure chest (you can use gold shiny wrapping paper.) You don't need a top on it, and the inside doesn't need to be wrapped. Fill the inside with birdseed--large bags are available at Costco. Then bury little toys and have the kids take turns digging. Have enough things buried so each kid gets 2 or 3 turns to pick one. Afterwards you can give each child a ziploc bag of birdseed to take home so they can feed the birds too.

Where to get ''treasure'' party stuff and lots of little toys: Oriental Trading Company. Try this link: http://www.orientaltrading.com/otcweb/application?namespace=browse&origin=categoryDisplay.jsp&event=link.itemDetails&sku=PT6&mode=Browsing&catDestinationJSP=/browse/categoryForward.jsp?categoryId=375600 Have fun! Heidi

More ideas

First, I gave my son a pirates party when he was 5 and it was the best birthday party he's ever had. For the treasure hunt I held it in Live Oak park, went to the park to scope out various hiding places a week in advance, then wrote the clues for the treasure hunt so that they pointed to each other, then went to the park an hour before the party and hid them in the appropriate places. The clues were in envelopes and each child had a clue with his or her name on it. The kids raced around in a group from place to place, and did the whole thing a lot faster than I thought they would. It's a public park, so there were other people around, but they all seemed amused by watching this gang of excited 5 year olds.

The treasure, which I had concealed under one of the picnic tables, was in a chest I'd made of an old cardboard box and decorated with skull and cross bones, etc. It consisted of plastic hand hooks, eye patches, bandanas, and gold coins (chocolates). I also had clues in cupcakes about a mysterious hidden treasure on the party table, which turned out to be eyebrow pencils I used to draw mustaches on the kids. All in all a great success.

(1) Some kids run faster than others, so the quick kids tend to find the clues. If there are different ages or sizes at the party, you might group kids by size or age so the slower ones don't end up collapsing in puddles of misery when others find all the clues before they get there.

(2) Reading differences can make the clue-reading a challenge. In the 6-year-old age range, reading and comprehension skills can be quite disparate. The more consolidated readers will read clues so fast that no one else gets it. The newer readers will struggle to sound out words so no one gets it. Everyone wants to read, but the others tend to get impatient no matter what the reader's style. We found it helped to have a grownup reader. We told kids the grownups will read, and then wrapped clues in tin foil to give the grownups time to get there and wrest the clues from bouncing kids.

(3) Be prepared to guide the kids with questions about the clues; they will be inclined to run off before talking to each other and figuring out where to go. (Maybe this is less of a problem with girls; as a Mom of boys, I am unfamiliar with the other species.)
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All party goers can be given bandanas to wear (and used for blindfolds in a pin the X on the treasure map game). Eye patches are tempting, but kids lack depth perception while wearing them, and may fall down stairs. Chocolate coins make great treasure. Cheap plastic bead necklaces make good loot.

And, lest you think that this is only for boys, let me assure you that our girls both had great fun with this.

Party dad dressed up as a pirate, and gave all the new recruits a pep talk about the fabulous treasure hunt. Each clue can be read out loud to the group if they can't read yet, but our girls were reading themselves.

Roger