It’s almost time to dust off the fancy dress and put up your spooktacular decorations ahead of Halloween! If you happen to have a birthday around this time of year, why not host your very own spine-tingling soiree or throw your little one a frighteningly cool birthday party to celebrate? Here are our favourite Halloween birthday party ideas.
Halloween Birthday Party Themes
Naturally, with a birthday party taking place around the spookiest time of the year, you might think that the only theme open to you is Halloween itself. But why stop there? There are plenty of other birthday party ideas for everyone.
Whether it’s dinosaurs or mermaids, science, or sports, it’s the perfect time to spookify your ideal theme for any other time of year. Whether you choose to have a fancy dress party or not, there is plenty of choice for turning your dinosaur or mermaid party to the dark side by incorporating your chosen theme into spooky foods, spooky decor, or spooky games. Rescue your mermaids from the spooky jelly swamp or discover decades-old-dinosaurs by hosting your very own archaeological dig, complete with cobwebs.
If you have a budding scientist, a science party could prove the perfect theme as you create weird and wacky experiments that bring more than just the party to life! Even if you’re looking to have a seemingly-unrelated sports party, think about how your guests could come dressed as their favourite sports heroes from times gone by or create games with a spooky twist – spider football where you have to get the ball past an eight-legged goalkeeper is sure to provide plenty of entertainment!
And if you, or your child, really loves Halloween – then why not go full tilt and host a gruesome get-together complete with scary characters, apple-bobbing and trick-or-treating?
Party Decor
Once you’ve decided your theme, it’s time to get decorating! Our favourite birthday party ideas are much like our themes – all the usual, with extra spook value!
The great thing about a Halloween birthday party is that your imagination really is the only limit you have! It’s also the perfect reason to decorate outside the house or party venue!
Add cobwebs to any party to up the ante and get your guests wondering where the next spider might appear from! Add mini toy spiders to the inside of your balloons to add an extra creepy factor! Use orange and black as your colour theme for any decorations or get out the glitter to make your cobwebs more glamorous.
There are also some really fun pop-up decorations for indoor or outdoor use that are sure to wow your guests. The great thing with this is that you can leave your decor up for more than just the party to make sure you celebrate the whole season. Don’t forget about all the fun lighting you can use too! Whether it’s light projections outside or pumpkin fairy lights, you can use your lighting to give your party that extra spooky vibe!
Party Food
Food is definitely what takes a party from good to great for most people and Halloween party food can be really fun to make! Whilst there are lots of great ready-made options available around this scarily good period, there are also lots of things you can make from home.
Some of our favourite party food ideas include:
- Brain Jelly
Find a brain-shaped jelly mould and make sure to create it in a fluorescent green or bright red colour! Add wiggly worms or teeth for an extra fright
- Spooky Cookies
Whatever your favourite biscuit, be sure to add lots of additional eyes as decoration to bring your biscuits to life! You could even add your choice of food colouring to add to the creepiness!
- Dinosaur Bites
Using red and green apple slices, marshmallows and a touch of peanut butter (or salted caramel), create your very own stegosaurus or triceratops. Simply take a slice of apple and use the peanut butter (or caramel) to stick the spiny marshmallows to their apple body. Add some of the eyes you used in the cookies for your dino eyes and you could even use little chocolate sticks or gummy sweets for the feet. Alternatively, you could use the same ingredients to make some monster mouths or crocodile teeth!
- Cake
Inevitable at most birthday parties and a Halloween birthday party should be no different. If you don’t want to have one large cake, why not opt for Halloween-coloured cupcakes? Your kids could even help decorate them if you’re making them at home.
- Savoury Options
Why not turn your breadsticks or cheese twists into spooky fingers? Use a sliced olive and almond to create a gruesome fingernail and add tomato puree to the dough for a blood effect! For younger children, use a Halloween-shaped cookie cutter to cut out different shapes of their favourite sandwiches.
Serve up hair-raising hot dogs by using string cheese as the hot dog hair and using apple squares with mustard or ketchup to make little eyes.
How to get the kids involved
For all of your Halloween birthday party ideas, kids can be the focus. Whether it’s getting them to pick out a costume or helping you create the food, they can be involved right from the planning stages. Similarly, on the day, you could put them in charge of one of the games (if they’re older) or for younger children, why not let them host their own in-house trick-or-treat where they are in charge of who has to do tricks and who the lucky ones are to receive treats.
Lastly, for kids who are struggling to stay in the spooky spirit, why not take a simple idea like decorating gingerbread or cookies and let them have a quiet moment to sit down, get involved and then have a yummy treat to enjoy? Instead of the usual decorations, you could have them decorate pumpkin-shaped biscuits, or create their own little Frankenstein gingerbread people. The choices are endless!
So, however, you’re celebrating this year we hope you have a spooktacular time! We’d love to see what you get up to – follow and tag us on Instagram!
