With Halloween night just around the corner and little ones already anxious to dress up in spooky attire and go trick or treating, many parents are looking for party ideas for their kids.
But while the traditional door-to-door Halloween evening candy rampage is a staple of the autumn holiday, parents now feel more comfortable hosting a Halloween party for kids within the safety of their backyard.
In reality, keeping a group of unruly kids entertained can prove to be a challenge. How to make it even more engaging and fun? How to keep them occupied for the entire evening? If you’re planning to host this year, here are our Top 10 Halloween party planning tips and ideas for kids to help you out:
How Do You Host a Kids’ Halloween Party?
Planning Is Everything
The first piece of advice on our list of Halloween party ideas for kids is to try planning the event at least two weeks in advance. A month would be ideal. Pick the date and arrange a guest list. As a rule of thumb, you may use your child’s age as a guideline. For example, if your kid is 6 years old, you should invite six of their closest friends.
If your kid is 10, organize a party for 10. This will prevent your house from becoming a daycare center and there will also be enough designated chaperones among the parents to keep an eye out.
Pick a Theme!
Decide in advance on whether you want to use a theme or not. Younger kids will be satisfied with a general “Halloween” theme that includes ghosts and monsters. However, a 10 to 14 age segment that is already used to the whole spooky season routine might prefer a more specific approach. Think Zombie Party, Pirate Ghost Ship, Egyptian Demons, and whatnot.
This is also a perfect opportunity to peek into your child’s interests. Is he a superhero fan? You can give that theme a Halloween twist. Take a few hours off to decorate the house with fun Halloween stickers, superhero temporary tattoos, spider webs, jack-o-lanterns, hanging skeletons, bats and spiders.
Want to make little ones jump with joy? Welcome them with temporary tattoos such as metallic mermaid, sugar skull, cute witch, or glow-in-the-dark monster, and help them get into the groove faster!
Send Halloween Party Invitations
Sending invitations by post is a great approach since it allows you to include important information — opposite to just letting people know or quickly emailing them. Include a time for both start and finish and let the parents know about the activities that will take place.
Moreover, nothing beats the great feeling of receiving a proper party invite!
Include a List Of Recommended Sweets
Since many of the parents will choose to contribute with the candy themselves, you may include a list of recommended sweets in case some of the children are allergic to certain foods.
Create The Most Fun Invitations With Halloween Stickers & Temporary Tattoos
Looking for more Halloween Party ideas for kids? Keep reading!
Back to the invitations. How about making them super fun by using colorful pictures, pop-ups, creepy fonts, or glitter.
You can also mark the occasion by using temporary tattoos with Halloween designs for an added touch of fun.
Kids love temporary tattoos! Seeing an envelope sealed by a glowing in the dark spider or a dark skull will make them even more excited about the upcoming event. Of course, keep it child-friendly!
Dancing skeletons, bats, green goo, white ghosts are all usable. Make it look like the coolest event in the neighborhood.
Top 10 Halloween Party Ideas For Kids
1. Get Creative With Costumes…On a Budget
Halloween party ideas for kids involve dressing up (of course).
Renting costumes is always a solution with plenty of online stores available as many party-goers will have a specific villain in mind. But don’t shun the idea of spending a few hours assembling the costumes from scratch. An old bedsheet can make for a great ghost, while a few rolls of gauze can make for a great mummy. Tearing and splattering some old clothes to make a zombie is also tons of fun and will create a bonding experience between family and friends.
2. Accessorize With Halloween Stickers & Temporary Tattoos
Do you know what makes for a badass pirate or a ferocious shark? Temporary tattoos, of course!
A temp tattoo is perfectly safe for children of all ages and can last for 2 to 4 days, depending on its size, placement on the body, and how much friction it endures.
Remember to clean the skin of any oils and dirt before applying the tattoo to really make it stick.
Besides dressing up and accessorizing with temporary designs, this is a great opportunity for group activities…and fun Halloween games!
3. Pumpkin Carving Competition
Other than temporary tattoos, which you can use for costumes and decorations; if you have older kids who want to get their hands sticky, organize a pumpkin carving competition.
4. Play Find The Spider
For the younger kids, you can play “find the spider” by drawing a spider web with gaff tape on the ground. The goal of the game is to keep your balance and complete the maze.
5. Witch Hat Tossing
Little ones will also love to try their skills at witch hat tossing — basically a themed adaptation of the old ring toss kids game.
6. Slime Shooting & Hanging Donuts
Don’t you love these Halloween ideas for kids!? For this one, they can try their hand at target practice by shooting slime at cut-out skeletons. Moreover, they can also choose to play a game that forbids using hands altogether, like a hanging-donuts eating competition or bobbing for pumpkins.
7. Playing Eye Pong
A set of plastic eyeballs can also make for many great games. Eye pong (the same principle of beer pong, minus the alcohol, duh!) is one of them. Still, you can also organize an “eyeball hunt” around the garden to help the sugar rush wear off.
8. Karaoke Time
Karaoke is another fun activity that can be easily adapted to a Halloween setting. The internet is chock-full of spooky (kid-friendly) songs such as “This is Halloween” from “Nightmare Before Christmas” or “Five little ghosts.”
9. Scavenger Hunt With Clues
Here comes another top Halloween party game! Scavenger hunts don’t necessarily have to cover a lot of ground. You can reduce them to your living room — especially if you add a few clues into the mix for the kids to decipher.
10. Gross Mystery Box
Make sure to have a “gross out box,” which always gets a laugh and is very easy to procure. You can use commercial goo, or just go the old fashion way and use bowls of pasta. The slimier, the better.
Use toilet paper for mummy wrapping competitions, candy corn for fake monster teeth, and cotton candy for spider webs.
Wrapping Up The Best Halloween Party Ideas For Kids
Your efforts will be well rewarded come October 31st. Remember that Halloween is about creativity, family, and friends. The memories you create during the holidays stick with the young ones for the rest of their lives. So have the best spooky time!
Whatever you decide to do, make sure there’s a little something for everyone to enjoy.
If you enjoyed our Halloween ideas for kids, you might also like:
- Glow In The Dark Party Ideas
- Popular Tattoo Designs For Men
- 5 Fun Birthday Party Ideas Using Temporary Tattoos For Kids!!
