Five Kinds Of Birthday Party Ideas For Kids

Along with games and activities you can include, plus how you can throw your kids an awesome party without breaking the bank!

Desperately trawling the internet for creative ideas for kids’ birthday parties?

Want to organize a birthday celebration for your children that they’ll remember for years, but just can’t figure out how to do it?

Looking for ways to celebrate your kids’ birthday that the birthday boy/girl will find engaging and that the party guests (children) would feel inspired to participate in?

Then this is what you’re looking for: a list of engaging and memorable birthday party ideas for kids.

When it comes to hosting birthday parties for kids (skip if you’d rather just look through the party ideas)

There’s a few things we find that almost every parent has on their checklist:

• The party must be one that the children will feel an urge to actively participate in.
  • As opposed to standing in a corner till it’s ‘their turn’ to take part.
• The party must not be too difficult to organize, and should be a safe and secure experience.
• And, finally, brownie points if the children get something out of it, apart from the fun of the party itself.

Now, full confession: We do host birthday parties for children.

Not only that, we host other group activities for children, such as school excursions and vacation care events.

Which is what gives us a unique insight into what works, and what doesn’t, when it comes to hosting birthday parties for kids.

Kids’ Birthday Party Idea #1 – Go on a picnic

A day out in nature, giving your children a chance to breathe in fresh air, and teaching them as much about trees, flowers, animals and insects as you can.

One of the healthiest and best birthday party ideas for children!

Here’s what a typical birthday party picnic would involve:

• Meetup, headcount, and division of responsibilities among the adults (ensuring all the children are there, making sure they follow COVID rules, first aid would be some of the responsibilities).
• Trek to a campsite.
• Set up camp.
  • Fun and games (scroll below for birthday party game and activity ideas).
  • Birthday song and cake cutting.
  • Food time!
  • Campsite cleanup.
• Trek back to the parking spot/bus stop.

Kids’ Birthday Party Idea #2 – Backyard camping

Don’t want to go through the trouble of taking so many children to a park and trekking up to a camping spot?

No problem!

A reasonably large backyard will do just fine!

Set up tents in the backyard, and give them children the feeling of a picnic.

Backyard DIY amusement park birthday party

With some planning, you can convert a backyard into an amusement park (sort of) for your children’s birthday party.

First of all you have the basic inflatable stuff, like a trampoline, swimming pool, bouncy castle and so on.

Then, you can add a homemade roller coaster.

Finally, with some more careful planning, you can create a ‘drive through’ food stall that kids can order food from, in toy cars.

Kids’ Birthday Party Idea #3 – Hire a venue

Like I need to tell you there are party venues that specialize in hosting birthday (and other) parties for children.

You can hire a birthday party venue, and they’ll host your children’s birthday party for you!

Children’s birthday party at Entermission

Here’s what you can expect from an Entermission Sydney birthday party for children.

• Exciting Virtual Reality escape room games (with the full VR experience, including haptics, hand-tracking, and special effects).
• Birthday cake cutting, song and games.
• Arcade VR games.
• Photo session to remember the special day.

Kids’ Birthday Party Idea #4 – City tour

An educational birthday activity for kids that would see the little ones know more about their city, and about their lives.

Where to take the children for the city tour birthday party (a few suggestions):

• Museums.
• City council and courthouse.
  • Give them a brief idea of what they’re all about.
• Statues, monuments, and artworks.
• Zoos and parks.
• Other city attractions.
  • For example, in Sydney, you could take them to Sydney Harbour, Bondi Beach, the Observatory, Sydney Cricket Ground, and so on.

Kids’ Birthday Party Idea #5 – Special sleepover

No, I’m not talking about your normal sleepover at someone’s house.

I’m talking about the sleepovers that many zoos and museums offer.

Think of it as a sleepover, a venue birthday party, and a museum tour combined.

Kids’ Birthday Party Ideas – Games and activities

A few birthday party games and activities that the children will really enjoy, and that won’t be too difficult to put together:

Treasure hunt

Here’s how we would organize a treasure hunt for a children’s birthday party (inspired by the VR escape room experience):

• First of all, you’ll have to create the ‘treasures’. It doesn’t have to be anything extravagant – even coloured rocks will do.
• Try to think of an environment that the children will connect to.
  • For example, if the children have been watching a lot of Doctor Who recently, try to come up with a game environment based on that.
• Next, chalk out a detailed ‘mission’ – in other words, a path that the children have to follow.
  • If possible, give each piece of ‘treasure’ a special meaning (for example one could grant ‘invisibility powers’).
• And then create clues and puzzles that the children will have to find and overcome to advance through the game.
• Now you have the logical outline of the hunt. It’s time to create an action plan to actually create the hunt.
• With the physical hunt set up, draw up a treasure map for the players to follow!

This is just a suggestion.

And yes, it does require a lot of effort from you.

If you’d rather avoid all that, just hide ‘treasures’ all around the treasure hunt area (it could be a floor of your house, or an area of the picnic spot marked off with chalk).

Whoever gets the most ‘treasures’ wins a special prize (a bag of candy is good)!

This game can:

• Inspire players to perform under pressure.
• Convince children about the importance of working together (teamwork and team building) to achieve a goal.

Balloons challenge

In short, participants will find challenges they must do inside balloons.

• Write down challenges (like, sing a song) and rewards (line, being allowed the first piece of birthday cake after the birthday boy or girl) on pieces of paper.
• Put them inside balloons (one challenge in each balloon), and then inflate the balloons.
• In every round, a balloon is given to one of the participants.
• Have a clock count down the game time (say 60 seconds). During this time, the participant can either just keep the balloon, or pass it to someone else, who in turn can either keep it or pass it along…and so on.
  • You can play songs the children like to mark the time, instead of a clock countdown. The song must stop at the end of the game time.
  • Remember, the balloon can have either a reward or a challenge. That’s the fun – do participants retain the balloon hoping to win a reward, or do they pass it along, to avoid the challenge?

This game can:

• Give the children a taste of having to take decisions (to keep or to pass the balloon) without knowing the outcome. I think you’ll agree this is something we all have had to face in our real, adult lives.
• Teach the children the importance of staying focused on a task. Especially if you play songs to mark the time, as the children would have to resist listening to the song, and focus on playing the game.

Marble and spoon race

I think you know how this works.

• Two tables set some distance apart. Place the same number of bowls on each table.
• Fill the bowls on one table (the starting table) with marbles.
  • Again, each bowl should have the same number of marbles.
• Get spoons, one for each bowl.
• Each player gets a spoon, and is assigned two bowls – one on the starting table and one on the other table.
• The objective of the game is for players to transfer all their marbles from one table to the other.
  • They must balance the marbles on their spoon, which they will be holding in their mouth, to move them.
• Whoever transfers their marbles the fastest, wins the game. Or whoever is the slowest, is eliminated from the next round.

You can make the game more fun by making it a relay game.

That is, every bowl has 2 players. One player transfers one marble to the other table, and then gives the spoon to their team mate who in turn transfers one more marble to the other table, and this goes on till all the marbles have been transferred to the other table.

This game can:

• Impart balancing skills to children.
• If you opt for the relay version, it can teach players of the importance of supporting your team, particularly if your team mate is struggling.

Obstacle course

There are many kinds of themes you can set, but the basic game is the same.

We’ll take the ‘volcano’ theme.

• Mark off an area as the course.
• Place various objects, such as tyres, bubble wrap, chairs and so on. These represent ‘safe ground’ in the game.
• The theme is that a volcano has erupted, and the ground is the lava.
• Players must get from one end of the course to the other, stepping only on the ‘safe ground’. If they set foot on the actual ground (the ‘lava’), they are eliminated.

Simon says

Gif via giphy.

Simple.

• Select a leader.
• If the leader says “Simon Says”, and then describes or does a task, players must also start doing the same task.
  • The player that’s last to finish the task is eliminated.
• If the leader doesn’t say “Simon Says” or says something else and then does something, the players must not follow.
  • Players who still do the task are eliminated.
• This goes on till there’s only one player left.
  • Then the leader does another task. If the final player follows the “Simon Says” rule, the player wins. If the final player doesn’t follow the rule, the leader wins.

This game can:

• Teach children about the importance of remaining alert and focused. They must be focused on what the leader is saying (or not saying) while also copying the leader’s actions faster than the others.

Tips for having a budget-friendly children’s birthday party

Wanna throw an awesome birthday party for your children without breaking the bank?

Here are a few tips on how you can organize a memorable birthday celebration for kids, while sticking to a budget.

Buying party supplies well in advance

Some birthday party supplies (like balloons and confetti) are inevitable, regardless of the exact party details.

Buy them well in advance of the actual birthday.

This gives you time to hunt for bargains, AND removes the need for last-minute panic buying (which is a known culprit in driving up the cost of parties, everywhere).

Avoid the party store as much as you can

I think you can guess what I’m driving at.

Many party stores mark up items significantly over their price at normal retail shops.

For example, chocolates retailing for 10-15 cents each might end up setting you back by 20 cents each at a party store.

OK, you might have to repackage some of the items for the party, but the savings should make it worth the effort!

Electronic invitations

Gif via giphy.

Good old paper mail might add to the birthday party spirit, but if budget is a concern for you, then you should really go for electronic invitations.

Buddies’ birthday party

If your kid and their buddy have birthdays close to each other, you can consider a shared buddies’ birthday party.

Many children would like to share their birthday celebration with a friend.

Discuss it with your child, and then approach the parents of the other kid about it. Needless to say, the content of the discussions will be different.

You can share the childrens’ birthday activities, birthday shows, and even perhaps (with some creative design), birthday cake.

But you WILL need to ensure that gifts remain separate, and that both the birthday kids get their respective birthday presents.

So…in hosting the birthday party for your kids,

Did this post give you the inspiration you needed to start planning?

How useful did you find our birthday party for children guide?

• Did you select one of our five kids birthday party ideas to plan the birthday celebration for your children?
• Did you select one or more of our games and activities ideas for the party?

Let us know in a comment below, AND…

Entermission VR Escape Rooms wishes your child/children a very happy birthday!