Crafty Fall Party Ideas
Fall can be one of the most fun and creative times of the year for your kid. Halloween gives him a chance to use his imagination to come up with great costume ideas, participate in fun crafts and of course, on Halloween night itself, collect treats! But Halloween can also be an imaginative time for parents and a chance to really create some fun experiences for their kids.
If you’d planned on having a party, you might be stressing out over what you’re going to do to keep your kids entertained and get into the Halloween holiday spirit. Whether you’re having a party for your child and his/her friends, or just trying to come up with some fun things to do as a family, I found some really cool ideas in Parents magazine for everything from the party invitations, to interactive games and themed snacks.
The Invitations
Design your own cards. The 31st is quickly approaching, so this is about the latest you should be sending out your invitations, whether you intend to have your party on the day itself or the weekend before. Thankfully, when time is at a minimum, putting together invitations can be easy, even if you make them yourself. Get some black bifold cards from your local party or craft store (or even just your local office supply store!) and have your kids help you glue googly eyes to the front of the card to make your own spooky party invites.
The Decorations
Dress up your pumpkins. Even your pumpkins can wear costumes on Halloween. Stack up three pumpkins (using a ¾” dowel through them to keep them from tipping over) to create a pumpkin person – it’s the same theory as is behind a snowman! Draw faces on them or even use your carved jack-o-lantern at the top and dress them up in costumes.
The Snacks
Turn veggies into candy. Because kids will have candy on the brain when Halloween comes around, it might be harder than usual to get them interested in healthy snacks. Arrange veggies like carrots, orange and yellow peppers and cauliflower on an oval-shaped plate to make them look like candy corn. For a fun addition, you can also carve out a small pumpkin and fill it with hummus or another type of dip.
Disguise your apples. Put costumes on your apples by cutting out a wedge for the mouth and decorating with different kinds of candy to give them faces and other fun details. This is a great activity to get your kids to help you with. If you’re having a hard time imagining what this looks like, the Parents website has photos and further instructions for what are called Apple Monsters.
Make your hot chocolate spooky. Get crafty with your hot chocolate by making a candy face in the whipped cream on top. This is an easy craft for party guests to do themselves.
The Games
Bowl with mummies and ghosts. You can make your own Halloween bowling game out of recycled soda bottles. Make bowling pins out of soda bottles and dress them up with white fabric. Add black felt eyes and mouths. Then, “mummify” a bowling ball and add googly eyes. This probably isn’t an ideal indoor game, but if you have space (if you have a yard or move your party to the park) it can be fun for kids and adults.
Organize a bone hunt. (This one’s my favorite!) Paint dog milkbones different colors and hide them throughout the yard, park (or even in your house). Send kids out to search for them – like an Easter egg hunt – and give a special prize to the kid that finds the orange or black bone.
Hopefully you found something useful in the above list that you can add to your own Halloween traditions … or that inspired some other great ideas you can use to make some lasting fall memories with your kids. Because time moves way too fast, we need to make every Halloween and every other moment as special as possible! Enjoy our song “It’s Your Kid” below, and celebrate all the big (and little!) milestones. Please also share with us in the comments section what you’ll be doing for Halloween! We’ll be at the Museum of Natural History! xo – Amelia
