Boo-tac-u-lar Party

Do you remember being a kid on Halloween?

…well I want my kids to! And I guess that’s why we go above and beyond to play, plan and pretend this season!

This includes the (cue announcer voice) Room Party! Yes that month long load of planning and creating, spending the mini-budget from the school and then way too much of your own money for 30 minutes of classroom take over fun!

My son is in 2^nd grade, and yes by now the amount of helper parents is a little less, but I don’t mind – in fact my son and I love to dream up games to play and then bring them to life. I certainly don’t want to disappoint and love how proud he is to own this day with his friends. 

I invested in table cloths to cover each of their desk groups, streamers, balloons and paper Halloween decor to spook of the room. I also created a banner on banner paper and easy hand drawn graphics to spread cheer at the front of the room. 

This year we will be breaking up his the class of 24 into four groups that travel the room to four spooky game stations and then bring the class together for classics like Toilet Paper Mummy and Pumpkin Hot Potatoe “Hot Jackolantern.” Great helper moms that day will lead each group through the party and pitch in too! I remember my own mom having “room mom” meetings in our kitchen, but today it’s all done via e-mail and as busy as everyone is that works for me!

Our Four Games Stations include:

1)   Boo Boxes – for this I saved up empty cardboard boxes from tissues, to deliveries, and with a mild Amazon.com addiction that was no problem. Then I wrapped them in black and white paper and glued various googley eyes on the sides  - because everything is better with googley eyes! The game – see who can stack the tallest tower in the 5-7 minutes.

2)   Halloween Rocks – for this I was brave and contacted our neighborhood nursery Smith Brothers Landscaping. They agreed to donate river rocks to the class. Then I painted the rocks in white, purple, orange, and green. With a few samples for inspiration the kids are able to decorate two rocks each using sharpie markers as their craft to take home. 

3)   Creepy Creature Toss – this was my “easy game” aka easy to make, easy to transport, and I had most of the items already. Basically bozo buckets with decorated buckets and tossing rubber creepy animals like rats, spiders and bats in the “trash.”

4)   What’s in store – this game is my favorite because my son came up with the idea and we brought it to life! It’s a blind sensory box to guess what creepy item you’re touching in the hole. To do this I spray painted an old sturdy lidded box black and then dry brushed green, grey, purple etc. to distress it. I used glue and gorilla tape to create center and side dividers within the box acting as compartments to the hand sized holes cut in the sides of the box. Lastly I added felt poke holes over the cut holes in the box sides to hamper those who try to peek inside and numbered each box so that the kids can record their guesses of what’s inside. 

The game: back-story will be explained in a little poem explaining that the witch went to the store to make her famous Halloween stew and her list got mixed up and she doesn’t know what to do! In the game, kids make a list of what’s in the store – then at the end of the party we read a new poem of answers and make the stew to “Poof” reveal treat bags just for you!

I’m currently all packed up (5 boxes total – hope it fits in the car – will definitely bring a dolly to tote it in)  - hoping they have fun and it doesn’t snow for trick or treating that night!