How do you throw an unforgettable celebration with simple, budget-friendly kids’ birthday party ideas? The good news is that having a memorable birthday party for kids doesn’t need much money. You can have a fantastic birthday celebration at little cost, but you can wow your guests. We have summarized 25 kids’ birthday party ideas that will help you to throw a great birthday party without breaking the bank. Sit back, relax, and scroll down the birthday party ideas.
How do you throw a good kid’s party?
The first step for your kid’s party preparation is the budget. You should determine the budget before planning the party. After organizing the budget, make the party more personal to your kids. Choose the specific party ideas, whether a pool party, escape room party, animal-themed party or others.
Then, pick the party’s location. The house or backyard is a perfect location for a budget-friendly party. Don’t forget to create unique invitations based on the themed party. You can make appealing decorations, serve food and drinks, and set up fun activities during the party.
1. Playground Party
When it comes to kids’ birthday party ideas, a playground party is a perfect option for your child. The party offers a memorable and fun experience on a low budget. You can use the backyard or the nearest park to hold the party. Of course, you don’t need to pay for a party planner, cleaning services, or extra payment.
The meals are also optional. Whether you serve up hot dogs, burgers, or pizza, the playground party offers everything for the guests. The outdoor venue also presents unlimited spaces for the guests, including a grassy lawn, restroom, and more—no worry about planning a local entertainer or other special performances. Summer is a perfect time to host a playground birthday party.
2. Puppet Show Party
Are you planning a great birthday party for your kids? A puppet show party is a great option. The show brings long-lasting memory to their life. Discover the local puppet show groups and choose the best one to put on a great show. Feel free to set the location, whether in the backyard or the other place.
Let your kids pick particular themes, from Sesame Street to princesses. The puppet show may feature clowns, singing, dancing, and funny games. The groups can personalize the show based on their preference. Of course, the puppet show is a simple way to entertain your kids with a limited budget.
3. Water Party
Summer is coming. It is a great time to celebrate kids’ birthday parties. Let your kids get a splash in the pool or waterpark. The venue offers dozens of chances to have fun with their friends outside. An array of creative, funny games keep them to stay cool during the party. From water slides to backyard water games, the party is entertaining for kids in the warm weather.
The water gun race can be the best option. The water game doesn’t need much preparation. All you need is water guns, a few aluminum foils, and a few rubber duckies. Get started to have a fun and memorable adventure. The other water birthday games, including water balloon volleyball, water slide, water jump, and more, are also great to choose from.
4. Little Town Party
Bring your kids to explore the town through a miniature. You can set and bring the towns in size for the little ones. Put parts of the town, including a grocery store, fire station, school, and more buildings. The little town is perfect for celebrating a birthday party while having a fun experience.
Whether you set up a DIY little town or rent a specific venue, the party is ideal for celebrating your special events. Involve your kids and their friends to customize the little towns. The party will spark their imagination and ignite their creativity. Let them imagine having a hospital, bakery, police station, and more in a small size.
How long should a children’s party last?
The birthday party lasts 1 to 3 hours, depending on the kids attending. For the kids aged 1 to 2, the party should last around 1 hour. The birthday party can last 1 ½ hour for kids ages 3 to 4 in the early to mid-afternoon.
It should be better for kids ages 5 to 6 to have a 2-hour party. Meanwhile, the birthday party for kids ages 7 to 8 is 2 to 2 ½ hour party time. You can hold a 3-hour party with kids ages 9 to 10. All of the parties take place early to late afternoon.
5. Baking Experience
Are your kids love baking? Let them celebrate their birthday with a baking party theme. The party is for girls and boys, whether making pizzas, cupcakes, or more. Your kids and their friends can decorate their own cupcakes. Through the baking experience, everyone can get full of fun and ignite the creativity.
You can attach a wooden spoon or a small apron for the invitation. All of the guests can be divided into several groups. Each group can make their pizzas. Let them ignite their creativity to shape the pizzas and add topping combinations. They can also add some veggies and sauce as they like. After creating the pizzas, feel free to savor the signature pizzas while playing games or singing along.
6. Magic Show
Do you want to amaze and dazzle your little ones? Inviting the brilliant magicians is perfect for celebrating the kids’ birthday. The magic show offers a great combination of incredible magic tricks and hilarious comedy. Of course, the show will amaze the guests with its jaw-dropping tricks.
The magic performance also guarantees the kids’ full involvement in the show. With its colorful props and great comedy gags, the kids absolutely love it. The birthday party turns into a truly magical party. All you need is to enjoy, relax, and let the magicians make the party that creates long-lasting memory.
7. Trampoline Party
Bring your little ones to trampoline parks if you plan a jumptastic kids’ birthday party idea. Let them have fun while having soft play and getting active on the trampoline. For a more fantastic experience, you can add bouncy balls, colorful balloons, and pop-up and push-down toys. The addition is a perfect way to get some entertainment at the party.
Instead of cups or glasses, you can give sports bottles with gumballs, bouncy balls and more as prizes. Giving the guests non-slip socks is also brilliant to level up their experience when jumping, climbing, or swinging on the trampoline. Best of all, most trampoline parks offer a unique theme based on your preference, like a sports theme, glow-in-the-dark party, and more.
8. Petting Zoo Party
Are your kids into animals? A petting zoo party is fun and engaging in celebrating a birthday. Whether you host the party in the zoo or bring the petting zoo into your house, the party is going to be a hit. The animals are always the stars, so you don’t need to create complex decoration ideas.
Start making unique invitations with some cute animals. Create petting zoo-themed decorations with colorful balloons using a hand pump or filled with helium. Don’t forget to make an outstanding backdrop for an excellent photo spot. You can serve kid-friendly food and drink, including a themed cake cup like a day-at-farm cake.
What games do you play at a kid birthday party?
You can play indoor and outdoor birthday party games. For indoor fun activities, bring the kids to play Escape room party. It is a superb game to challenge their problem-solving skills. All you need is a storyline, puzzles to solve and clues.
In addition, Hide & Seek is the most recommended game for kids. Break the kids up into a seeker and hiders. The seeker closes their eyes and starts counting to 10 while the other kids hide. The seeker should find until all of the hiders are found.
9. Glow-in-the-dark party
Throw a great glow-in-the-dark party for your beloved kids for an extraordinary experience. There are some ultimate ideas for having a glowing-themed play party. Of course, the party presents tons of fun for the little ones. You can create glow-in-the-dark stick balloons for the guests. Take the stick balloons in the swimming pool.
Besides the stick balloons, an array of the ultimate games are available, including glowing bowling, creating something with glow-in-the-dark play dough, making a picture with glow-in-the-dark chalk, and more. Plan an extraordinary birthday party if you want to hold a visually spectacular party like no other.
10. Circus Party
If you want to make an excellent kids’ birthday party, go with a circus theme party. The fun party can be awesome for everyone, including your little ones. Create a fun party invitation from the invitation, like a unique circus ticket. Let the guests consider that they are attending a circus show. You can also take a lot of snacks spread for great decoration.
To make the circus theme party look great, add a lightbox, showtime sign, circus tags, and colorful balloons, especially red, yellow, and blue. How about the food? You can serve up an array of carnival foods, including rock candy, circus peanuts, popcorn, cotton candy, circus animal cookies, and more.
You Might Also Like:
11. Rainbow Party
Rainbow-themed party offers so much fun and excitement. From affordable DIY party favors to great printable invitations, the colourful party will amaze your guests without no exceptions. First, surprise your guests with a DIY printable rainbow invitation. For the decoration, you can make a colorful rainbow balloon arch. It’s simple but appealing.
How about the food? You can serve rainbow smoothies to treat the guests. Of course, the kids love biting a mix of ice cream and cake, besides that. Rainbow fruit pizza is also perfect for satisfying guests. The pizza features colorful fruits, Greek yoghurt, crescent rolls, and more. Best of all, create a rainbow cake with a gumball as the beautiful cake topper
12. Lego Birthday Party
Lego birthday party presents full of excitement and fun. The party offers excellent inspiration for decorations, favors, and foods your children will like. The Lego party is ideal for kids of all ages. Feel free to set the colorful Lego men around the cake for decoration. The Lego party decoration offers a festive and bright theme. The Lego poster is also sensational.
Use red, yellow, blue, and green colors to make it looks perfect! Place some balloons to make the party more cheerful. For the foods, you can make cookies or brownies combined with icing. Add some colorful smarties on the top. Sandwiches and burgers are also an excellent treatment for the guests.
13. Sports Themed Party
Do you want to throw a sports party theme? You can go with a special party inspired by world-class events, including the Olympics, World Cup or Super Bowl. Feel free to choose the specific sport your kids like. You can create printed sports theme party invitations like sport event tickets, Coach’s playbook, or more.
For the decoration, you can add some posters of top-notch sports athletes, like Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, and others. Hanging a poster of Olympic Rings is also a great option. The party isn’t complete without engaging activities. Bring your guests to fun games like fun soccer, hula hoop contest, high jump, balancing races, obstacle courses, and more.
14. Backyard Carnival
The backyard is an excellent spot for celebrating kids’ parties. Make your own carnival in the backyard that your kids will love. Instead of playing video games, let the kids play and go through on the ground. The dart balloons game is perfect for making the guests excited. The carnival dunk tank awaits the guests to make them wet and cool down the party.
An array of alternative games like stilt race, ping pong toss, jellybean jar, cupcake walk, and more are also incredible for having fun. One of the most-visited booths in the carnival is the face painting station. Let the guests experience face tattoos as they please. It will also create a lively atmosphere during the party. Don’t forget to set a beautiful photo booth for taking selfies photos.
15. Active Party
Hosting an active party can be an excellent option for celebrating the kids’ parties. The party promotes not only healthier life but also tons of fun. Let the guests have physical activities at the party. A variety of indoor and outdoor games await. Whether you set up active games, traditional games, or less-active activities, the party will wow everyone.
Many accessible venues are available to host the party. You can invite the guests to have an active outing at a playground, adventure park, waterpark, or even your backyard. For the treats, you can serve some foods with gluten-free options like dried fruits, rice crackers, potato crisps, and other foods with less emphasis on ice cream, cake, and candy.
What foods are good for a birthday party?
Budget-friendly and hassle-free party foods are the best treats to serve the little ones. However, the ideal party foods depend on the kids’ ages. For the lunch and dinner party, you can go with veggies, pita, humus, pasta with meatballs, salad bar, grilled cheese with tomato soup, and more.
For the snacks, the party food ideas are fruit and veggies platters, popcorn, a meet & cheese tray, candy, salsa, and more. How about the dessert? You can create a festive cake with preferred themes, whether animal, sport, or superhero themes.
16. Unicorns Party
Planning a unicorn party is a good idea if your kids love all things about ponies and unicorns. You can go with a rainbow palette and unicorn dolls with yellow, purple, and pink colors. Give some touches with gold and mint tones in the decoration. Be sure to make the dessert table the most critical part of the party.
For the treats, create unicorn cakes with pastel rainbow bottoms. You can also serve a little dessert of chocolates, rice crispies, and other gorgeous desserts. The little popcorn mixed with rainbow sprinkles is also great for the guests. For more experience, you can rent a little unicorn to come to your house. Let the kids ride on the unicorn while taking photos or videos.
17. Escape Room Birthday
Are your kids into solving puzzles, detectives, and mysteries? The escape room birthday is superb. You can realize the party by designing cool invitations, rewarding treats, and jaw-dropping games. For the invitation party, you can design antique parchment paper. Give the guests challenging puzzles mixed with an enigmatic storyline.
Let your kids find clues, solve the puzzles, and complete the missions with the groups. How about the treatment? Create mystery cupcakes as the primary food. You can also make regular popcorn which will be a perfect treat during snack times. The puzzle-piece sugar cookies are also unique for escape room party foods.
18. Superhero Party
Whether your kids have today’s heroes like Aquaman, Captain America, or classic heroes, like batman, superman, or spiderman, a superhero theme party is sensational. Let’s begin the story with a powerful invitation. Create themed invitations with a superhero’s picture and backstory. Be sure the invitation should be bright, colorful, and bold.
Serve the guests simple foods dressed in superhero colors, including sandwiches, cupcakes, and more. To complete the party, you can set up the old classic party games jumping competition, hide & seek, or even nerf gun. You can give the super party goodie bags added pencils, party notebooks, gliders, and more for the ultimate finishing touch.
19. Moana Party
Are you looking for unusual kids’ birthday ideas? Moana party is the right answer. Bring your kids and guests to have an imaginary adventure across the South Pacific through the birthday party. Feel free to create a Moana party from the party foods, decorations, and games based on your preference. Get started with a mix of Hawaiian decorations and themed party ware.
For the foods and drinks, you can serve some themed snacks, including doughnut boats, kakamora cups, Luau water bottles, and other Moana-themed foods. How about the party games? You can set up an array of games like Hula dancing, Tiki Pinata, and Limbo. Best of all, give your guests party bags filled with some treats
20. Olympics Birthday Party
The Olympics party is not only for starting the opening ceremony but also for a kid’s birthday party your kids will love. Start the party by making Olympic-themed food, Olympic Torch Cupcake. You can make these special treats with flames and ice cream cones for the birthday party. You can also make Oreo gold medal cookies and cereal necklaces for the guests.
How about the decoration? Invite your kids to arrange flags from many countries as a beautiful backdrop. It is a small and fun idea to create something big. You can also décor the room with Olympic rings made from colourful fabrics. Let the kids play the Olympic Ring Ball Toss game or discuss Frisbee games for fun activities.
You Might Also Like:
21. Spa Day Party
A spa day is perfect if you want to throw your daughter’s birthday party. You can set the party up like in the spa station with different services. The guests pretend like spa customers to order the spa treatments. There are at least three stations, including a foot pampering station, a facial station, and a manicure station.
You can round the stations with spa party favors and delightful foods after taking treatments. Bring the guests to have fun with musical toenail polish activity. It is an entertaining game. Make a circle of 8 girls, each holding bottles containing a different color of polish. When the song plays, they pass polish around. But, when the music stopped, they had to polish their nail with the polish.
22. Musical Birthday Games Party
You can throw a musical-themed birthday party to celebrate your kids’ birthday parties. Whether your kids love listening to music, singing, or playing music, the party will create a memorable experience. For decoration ideas, you can set up the musical stages with a drum set and vibrant lighting. Add some album covers on the walls.
Then, serve you’re the-next musicians with sliced hot dogs, small portions of pizzas, sandwiches, or hamburgers. Create signature musical foods like CD pizza, chocolate drum sets, or sugar cookies. To keep the guests dancing and moving, you can play specific music based on your preference.
23. Balloon Games Party
Create a lifelong memory for your little kid’s birthday party with simple preparation. Celebrate the birthday by playing balloon party games. One of them is Catch a Balloon. It belongs to classical balloon games. Make a circle with an adult in the center. The kids can toss the balloon when they call out their names. There are also many ultimate balloon games, including a balloon race, Burst the sunny balloon, balloon dart, and more.
24. Pool Party
A pool party is a perfect choice to celebrate a birthday during the summer. Your little ones love to get wet and splash in the pool. You can use the small swimming pool or inflatable pool to create happiness. Take a specific theme: beach ball, under the sea, mermaid, and more. Get the guests excited with a fabulous invitation party.
You can use lanterns, swim rings, beach balls, flip flops or other decoration ideas. How about the food? Serve the guests some healthy and tasty snacks, including submarine sandwiches, banana splits sticks, easy beach cups, doughnut cupcake toppers, fruit salads, and more. The treasure hunt, floating treasures, and ping pong points are great for the activities.
25. Kids’ Painting Party
Are you finding for a great party for your kids? A painting party is a good idea. This party not only celebrate their birthday but also improve their skills and self-confidence in creating something. Invite your party guests with a paintbrush set or watercolor set. Therefore, the guest will be ready to paint when attending the party.
Place a paint-inspired dessert table and create a bright and colorful backdrop. You can create a paint pail-like cake dressed with cookies for the treats. The paint brush rice Krispy is perfect for the party dessert. Don’t forget to make rainbow cupcakes that show the real artwork. For the activities, let the guest paints their preferred objects to express their creativity.
Latest Post:
- 23 Fun Activities for Kids with ADHD to Build Confidence and Skills
- 22 Calming Activities for Kids with Anxiety: Chase Bad Thoughts Away!
- 26 Fun and Therapeutic Activities for Kids with Autism!
- Positive Self-Talk
- 22 Fun Activities for Kids at Home: Ideas to Chase Boredom Away
Frequently Asked Question (FAQ)
How do I host a kid’s party at home?
You can plan the party well, especially regarding the party ideas, foods, games, and favors. Call your kid to get involved in hosting the birthday party.
How much do you spend on a child’s birthday party?
The average spending for throwing the party is approximately $400 for decorations, food & drinks, gifts and more. However, you should spend extra budget calling entertainers or renting special venues outside your home.
How many gifts should a child get for a birthday?
Depending on the attendees, a child commonly gets 30 – 50 gifts for the birthday party. The more gifts your kid gets, the more people you invite.