7 year old bday party at home - please help!

[LaraWearsZara]

My DS is 7 early in Jan. We have spent a lot on him for bday and Xmas and have booked Harry Potter Studios dns a hotel as part of his birthday present.
His birthday is a Saturday so we have told him he can have 6 friends over late afternoon as opposed to a party, and we will order in domino's for dinner. Have offered for parents to stay for a drink or just drop and run, very much their choice.
However - I have NO CLUE how to make this fun. We are not creative! And as he's 7 I really don't want to create something babyish. Eg. Are they way beyond pass the parcel at this age, will I be setting him up for life as that kid who had a shit baby party if i do games like this?
Please help with ideas to make this a fun 2-3 hrs! It's 4 boys and 2 girls.
Thanks

Slim making, movie afternoon, gaming

*slime

My son had his 9th birthday party and he and his 5 friends requested games like pin the tail, musical statues, pass the parcel! It went down a storm and when it all got too rowdy we played sleeping lions! I bought some “medals” from the pound shop for the winners and sweets for prizes. They all had so much fun but there’s me thinking they were too old… but they thoroughly enjoyed themselves.

At 7 yes I think you need to organise games or activities. They aren't old enough to just hang out.

2 hrs is about the limit for a birthday party in my experience, after that they start sniping at each other as they are tired and over excited and usually over-sugared.

1 Hr - playing, games - kids in a small group are pretty good at entertaining themselves as long as you give them a space and access to stuff to do, my DD and her friends could easily kill off an hour just looking through her toys and telling each other what toys they have at home.
1 Hr - pizza, ice cream sundae bar and a film. Set up the living room so they can all sit in front of the TV either on chairs or cushions on the floor.

Son went to a party when he was 8 and they were still playing party games like pass the parcel. They went out and played football at one point too. Slime making sounds good.

For my dd’s 8th birthday, we invited friends over for a ‘spa day’ (we painted nails and then I made them lay quietly on mats on the floor with cheap face masks on). Then they had food and watched a film and ran around being silly listening to music until parents arrived. It was about 4 hours, which I think is more normal as they get older.

If a mix of boys/girls, you could do a disco followed by a film. One year we also did a treasure hunt around the village with clues for them to solve and a ‘treasure’ at the end (hidden box with sweets for everyone).

DD wasn't a big fan of party games; what worked for her was craft, so we'd do two or three crafts, interspersed with very gentle games. Baker Ross do craft kits, and if you go down that route, pick ones which don't need scissors or glue! Even if you do mostly games, crafts are relatively calm, which can help to stop guests becoming overwhelmed or overhyped.

Thanks all, some great ideas! Going to do the ring doughnut hanging off string game for sure too

I don't think too old. My 5 year old had some older kids attending and they loved pass the parcel! We also did a spider hunt (it was a spiderman theme.. 300 Spiders!!) and they traded them in for sweets... Could you do some kind of hunt?! It was a big hit!

Tesco have a make your own party hat kit for really cheap and that went down well too.. I think pass the parcel is absolutely fine especially if you have some prizes that they would actually find cool to get!

Great idea! How did the trade off work - 1 spider for 1 sweet?!

Thank you. I will definitely do this then!

I didn't want any arguing so I literally did a quick check they actually found some (which I knew they had and would have helped if they didn't!) and then just let them jump onto a pile of sweets on the floor pretty much and choose what they wanted!