Ideas for a halloween themed party

[mslady]

My Ds (3 year old) Is having his party in 2 weeks, I thought it would be a cute idea for the kids (& adults if they want to) to dress up, I figured that the kids would want to wear a costume more than just 1 time a year.... Do you think its a good idea or will the children be cranky from being uncomfortable? Also I need ideas on what kind of activities for them to do since most of their parties seem to have been indoors, (rainy or cold weather this time of year)... can anyone help? Thanks

as long as the costumes are simple they should be ok.
traditional, apple bobbing etc?
Food? orange jelly with worms etc in!
Buns with spiders on

When no-one is looking, put some food colouring in the bottom of your fanciest tea pot.
Get kids to put herbs in the teapot (eg chamomile, mint etc) and pour in boiling water. Get everybody to say spells, hopes and wishes into the teapot, then pour. Out comes magic liquid (potion)

Drink or ...

Alternatively, collect bottles and get people to decorate them and then to put the witches potion into them. It'll be a magic potion.

We do apple bobbing, face painting, pumpkin carving ( lots of adult help I know but its fun), witches/wizards hat making and fun food.

Can you have a couple of cheap spare cloaks / hats / masks for the children whose parents couldn't/wouldn't provide a costume? It always seems to happen with one or two and it's such a shame. Although my brother has a halloween party every year for a mixture of adults and children and anyone not in costume is refused entry!

i had a halloween party for my 3 yr old last yr and he loved it! they all got dressed up and did apple bobbing, pin the arm on the skeleton! (made that up myself, with a cheap skeleton decoration and took the arm off-

i did the cooking and found a great idea on a website. You get aload of lrg oranges and take out the fruit so you are left with the peel- (like you would to stuff a pepper), fill with RED jelly and put in the fridge- when set you can cut pumpkin faces into them..... they loved eating the jelly pumpkins!

I make little meringue ghosts and cookies that are decorated to look like spider web. You can decorate pumpkins without needing to carve them. Just have various things that can be used to make faces like different types of veg and sturdy toothpicks, sequins, felt, old hats, etc.

Bobbing for apples is fun or you could hang doughnuts on string from the ceiling and people have to eat them without using their hands. That can be a lot of fun too.

Another tip I was given, but haven't used yet, is to take an new unpowdered rubber glove and fill it with water dyed green using vegetable dye. Tie off the end tightly and put in the freezer. When it's frozen cut off the glove and you can use the hand in a punch bowl as monster ice.

Fantastic rubber glove idea Tex. That's a MUST!

Axemans snacks

Frankfurters cut into halves, cut a sliver from the top to look like a nail bed. make a fingernail out of a sliver of radish...keep the skin at the tip IYSWIM, put the nail on the nail bed.

But hod dog tolls in two and open up the middle with a wooden spoon, swirt some ketchup into the gap and wodge in the 'finger'. they look great

Thank You Soooo Much Ladies !!!! Great Ideas!

thanks for the idea martianbishop! I am having a fancy dress party for a club my dd attends. Children range in age from babies to 9. I am steering away from activities with food because of their costumes. We are doing lots of arts and crafts (making spiders, decoarting tea biscuits, embellishing party bags, painting pots) as well as games, apple bobbing, a graffitti wall (how many words can you make from 'haunted house', pin the nose on the pumpkin and assembling a skeleton. I have lots of adults to help too which will be fab. Our big event of the afternoon though is a treasure hunt. Since we meet on the Haymarket in London, there will be lots of Kiwi Kids in fancy dress wandering the West End looking for clues. I can't wait!!

Is apple bobbing purely putting a few apples in a washing up bowl and getting it out with mouth/teeth. Do they just get one go each or are they timed. Is there a "winner" Sorry to be a thicko.

I had a halloween party for DD last year and doing it again this year.

Last year I did a monster slime box which was a plastic storage box filled with cooked spaghetti, oil, food colouring and jelly. On top of this I put a decorated cardboard box with a hole cut out for reaching in. I got each child to "dare to put their hand in the slime box" and had buried little gifts and packets of sweets for them to retrieve. It was really really fun as alot of them were genuinely a bit unsure about what was in the box and the anticipation on their little faces was priceless.

I make dressing up optional - and it can be anything, not just a spooky costume!
Kids take the uncomfy bits off after they arrive!

Ladies, I did the party Saturday, Thanks for the advice....I had them dress up, all the kids looked soooo cute.....For food I did deviled eggs with a olive slice in the middle (to make them look like eyeballs)....I did the frozen glove which looked awesome...except I put green koolaid in it....also did a dirt cake, (pudding & coolwhip topped with crushed oreo cookies & gummie worms "crawling" in it.....and I made a dip with ground meat, rotel, & velveeta cheese....I took sour cream & piped it through a small food storage bag to make the shape of a spiderweb...The food looked great.....as far as activities we rented a fun jump, but had I not I would have gotten small pumpkins & let the kids decorate them with buttons, sequins glitter....etc....I just wanted to say thanks again for all of the good advice.....