Entertaining young children this Halloween? Tips on how to keep them occupied and happy.
Halloween parties are a great way to make holiday memories for young children. You can plan your party as simple or detailed as you choose.
The first step in planning your party is to decide how many children to invite. A good rule is one child for each year of age your child is at the time, but you may choose to invite fewer or more depending on how many friends your child has or how many children live in your neighborhood.
Two to three weeks before Halloween or the date you choose to host your party, invite your guests by phone or invitation. Purchased or handmade invitations can be mailed, or hand delivered if the children live in your neighborhood.
· Invitations should include:
You're invited to a Halloween Party at [Your Name] House
o Address: Your street address [add directions if you invite someone who has never been to your home]
o Date: Halloween [or your choice]
o Time: 5:30 - 8:00 p.m. [2 1/2 hours is about the limit for this age group]
o Wear a costume - faces will be painted at the party (We plan to trick-or-treat at a few houses on our street.)
[You may or may not want to include trick-or-treating, but it will be fun to have everyone in costume either way. You may want to prearrange a trick-or-treat visit with specific neighbors. *All parents should be informed in advance if you plan to trick-or-treat.]
o Hot dogs and chips will be served
RSVP: Your phone number
Handmade invitations can be a fun activity. Have your child select colorful construction paper. Cut each sheet in half then fold each sheet in half. Let your artist design the front of each card with a Halloween design: Jack O Lanterns, ghosts, or witches. Unless your child's penmanship is very good, you should fill in the invitation information. Invitations can also be made on the computer.
Planning a party is half the fun for children. Let them help select decorations, plan refreshments and activities. Purchase your decorations early to have the best choice.
Decorations can be as simple as a few streamers and balloons, or more detailed depending on your party budget. Here are a few ideas:
· Welcome your guests with a candle-lit Jack-O-Lantern placed on your front porch or on a table just inside your front door.
· Set the mood with a Halloween soundtrack [choose according to your age group to avoid frightening small children].
· Stretch cotton cobwebs across the windows and across the top corners of doorways. Add a few fake spiders.
· A trio of pumpkins with comical or scary painted faces could serve as a table centerpiece.
· Tape clusters of 3-4 orange and black balloons onto the backs of chairs.
Gather the supplies you will need for your Halloween activities:
· Face paint [easily found this time of year in the Halloween department]
· Pre-baked round sugar cookies, tubes of decorator frosting and tips [one tube for each child, a mixture of colors].
· Select a favorite Halloween story from your own collection of books or the library [the book should be read in 10-15 minutes].
· Halloween paper plates, cups and napkins.
· Hot dogs, buns, chips, miniature marshmallows, hot chocolate mix, Hawaiian punch, orange juice, and candy gummy worms [pour orange juice into several ice cube trays to freeze several hours before the party].
· Film for your camera.
· Plastic trick-or-treat bags
Welcome your guests to a dinner of Giant Fingers in a Bun [hot dogs], chips, and Ghoulish Punch [Hawaiian Punch with orange juice cubes. Drape gummy worms over a few ice cubes and over the side of the punch bowl.
Excited children often don't eat much, if children aren't through eating in about thirty minutes move on to your next activity: Face Painting.
Pair everyone up with a partner and a selection of face paint. You might have to help everyone get started, but it shouldn't take long for the excitement to set in and scary, funny and silly faces to appear. Have Handy-Wipes on hand for quick clean up of hands. Don't forget to take pictures of each finished masterpiece for your child's scrapbook [you'll want to have duplicates made so each child can have one of themselves as a memory of the evening]. Allow about thirty minutes for this activity.
Time to trick-or-treat. Make sure each child has a small bag and a partner, and don't forget a flashlight. If you have an extra adult, have one adult lead the group and the second follow up the rear, each with a flashlight. Since you are only going down one side of the street and back up the other side, it shouldn't be hard to keep your group together. Allow thirty minutes for this activity.
When you return give everyone a few minutes to wind down and check their loot while you set up for the next activity: Cookie decorating. After face painting, your artists won't need much prodding to create outrageously funny or scary faces. [Have enough cookies on hand so each child can decorate 2-3]. Serve with hot cocoa topped with marshmallows. Allow thirty minutes for this activity.
End your evening with story time. Invite everyone to sit in a circle on the carpet. Light a few candles and turn on a low wattage lamp near the circle and turn off the overhead lights. Join the circle and present the story in your most entertaining voice, stopping to share the pictures. [The story will allow the children time to wind down before their parents arrive to take them home.]
Video as much of the event as possible and take plenty of pictures!
