Y’all it’s that time of the year-fall fun!!!  Just the other day my son came home and said his friends were talking about our Halloween party and I looked at him puzzled because I’ve yet to send invites to anyone about a party but apparently everyone is enjoys it and expects it!

For those of you who are against celebrating Halloween I really like this perspective from another blogger Carolyn Henderson:

Yes, Halloween has pagan roots. All holidays do, ultimately. But as imaginative human beings, we reshape and reform the celebration and tradition to conform with our beliefs, and we wind up with highly personalized forms of observing Christmas, and Easter, and Valentine’s Day, and Halloween. What is most important — and more and more vital in a society that grasps for more and more control — is that the traditions we create strengthen, empower, and fortify families.

For the past 9 years our family has hosted a family friendly Halloween party in our community and this year we are going to take it up a notch and try a Trunk or Treat party in our cul-de-sac street. Actually, I think it’s going to be easier!

So here are some fun ideas and tips on how to throw a family friendly Halloween party.

How to Throw a Fun Family Friendly Halloween Party

Costumes–Decide if you want to allow scary costumes. We’ve always had friends with children of all ages so we ask our guest to stay away from ghoulish, scary costumes.

Venue–Decide your venue? In your house or outdoors. For us this makes a big difference in the amount of guest we can invite. Once we “rented” a place and though it gave us more room to have guest it ended up being a lot more work for me because I had only a few hours to decorate and set up. When it’s in my home I can slowly start setting up as the week leads up to our event.

Food or ??? –Decide if it’s going to be potluck style or appetizers you provide.  As a Mexican it was hard for me to fully buy into the concept of potluck parties but three years ago I had my first potluck party and since then I haven’t turned back.  It’s such a huge pressure off when you know you’re only providing one or two dishes. Usually people love to bring appetizers or desserts to this type of event because they want to try that fun Halloween treat they saw on Pinterest.

Halloween Party Kid’s Activities, Fun Food ideas and Decor

Fun food ideas:

Eyeball Punch!

Healthy & Delicious Popcorn Balls – go here for the recipe.

Healthy Frankenjuice – my kids begged for more and I giggled as I served them a cup full of veggies and fruits! You can go here for the recipe.

Healthy Boo-nanas! Another family favorite!  You can get the full recipe here!

Silly Pumpkins! We love to decorate these as a family and then we fill a huge jar and have them out on the table at our party. You can see here how we do it.

Mummy Pizza- This was so easy to put together and so fun! Get the details here.

I have a whole list of fun ideas just go here.

Halloween Activities and Games

These pumpkin jars are adorable and make perfect party favors or prizes.

Pumpkin play dough recipe here.

Ghostbuster stomp– We used this as an educational activity but this can totally be a fun game.

Pumpkin Punch– This was a favorite at our party last year.  I simply covered plastic cups with tissue paper and then duct tape them to the wooden board.

Halloween Bingo – Was also a big hit because it meant the kids got prizes!

Halloween Decor

Use lots of festive garland! Our decor is always simple but festive. Here I placed strands of garland at different heights in different areas. All of the garland was homemade using crepe paper, poster board paper and mini pumpkins.

Check out the dollar store! This was our goodie table. I bought the bowls. lantern and hat at the dollar store. The table runner is just fabric that I keep around for parties.

Use fabric! I highly recommend you buy polka dot fabric in lots of colors and just have around for parties. We have used our red, black, blue and orange polka dot fabric in so many of our events for either table cloths, back drops, table runners…

 

Use balloons! You can use white balloons for ghost or orange balloons for pumpkins. Or just colors that match your decor.