picture source invitations For the invitations, I found a Ninjago image online and used picmonkey and picasa to add the blue bubble box and the text, which I downloaded for free—it’s called Last Ninja. I made them into 4×6 photos so I didn’t use all my printer ink. 
decorations I found a few sites that used Ninja eyes on balloons (more info on the eyes in the party favor section below). 
I made tons of these asian paper laterns and hung them up on our stairs leading to the door and also in the back with the canopy. 
I did my best to paint Japanese symbols onto white poster board (try Dollar Tree—they are $0.50 each). Inspired by some great decorations HERE, by painting them myself rather than getting posters printed saved some money. I just used a foam brush and black acrylic paint and looked up the symbols HERE. The one on the front door is supposed to mean Welcome Ninjas. 
The ones hanging on the canopy mean things like “Ninja”, “Victory”, “Samaria”, etc. 
It was WINDY and I was so worried the decorations would tear, rip, and blow away. Surprisingly, everything held up perfectly. I hung the boards with some thick twine, tying a not through a hole punched in the corners. 
I found tons and tons of great ideas online for decorations, but my budget and time were short, so these decorations worked great! The canopy was awesome for decorating and having some shade in the backyard—I just borrowed it from a neighbor since we didn’t have one. food I never really go all out on food. I’d love to, but again, time and money are always an issue, so we keep the food simple. I printed out a Ninjago shuriken that I found online and enlarged, placed it under wax paper and traced the shape with melted white chocolate that had a little yellow food coloring added. 
Also, inside their favor bags were these fun pretzel nunchucks made by dipping pretzel rods in melted chocolate and adding twizzler pull and peel while the chocolate is still soft. I found that idea HERE. 
party favors I first saw the idea HERE to put Ninja eyes on party favor bags. 
I used THIS image (pinned HERE), made it into a 4×6 photo, and sent it off to Walmart so again, I didn’t use up my printer’s ink. I also used THIS site to find out how to write the kids’ names in Japanese (I’m sure they aren’t 100% accurate!). 
I found these pirate swords at Dollar Tree and spray painted them gold. 
I found another fun idea on THIS blog, where she directs you to THIS website. I omitted inappropriate or too violent ones, printed them off and rolled them up with black and red embroidery thread. 
My favorite party favor was a t-shirt! I was planning on making some quick ninja masks until I saw all the right color t-shirts at Dollar Tree. I was thrilled because I had just found out on YouTube that you can tie a t-shirt to look just like a ninja mask, so it was saving me time and money by buying t-shirts for a buck each! I grabbed the t-shirts and also took a series of pictures to make into a collage so the kids would know how to tie their masks once they got home. 
In their bags: the chocolate nunchucks, an origami star from a game we played (more about that on part two), their gold sword, the ninja wisdom scroll, their t-shirt (not pictured), a picture of the collage showing how to tie their shirts into the mask (not pictured), and a fortune cookie. 
The best sources of inspiration for me were the following places: Wants and Wishes Craft Interrupted Hostess with the Mostess