How to Throw The Best Halloween Party Ever

So, you want to have a Halloween party? Halloween parties are the easiest parties to host because there are so many ready-made ideas for games, snacks, decorations, and all-around fun. Here are some ideas to help you set the scene for a screaming good time!

Ghoulish Decorations

Light it up

Lighting and atmosphere can make a Halloween party extra special. Four packs of 12 flickering electric tea lights shine an eerie glow from inside carved pumpkins or glass jars. Line the walk up to your door with paper lunch bags, each one filled with sand or rocks to weight down the bag and a tea light. You can also clean out one-gallon milk jugs and paste on Halloween shapes cut from black construction paper. Place a flickering electric tea light inside and place the milk jugs around the party.

Smoke and Banners

Channel your inner mad scientist with a DIY smoke machine using dry ice. You can also set the scene with carved pumpkins. Print signs using online Halloween printables. Sometimes the best decorations are the most unexpected. A fall harvest or Christmas wreath can be eerily transformed with orange or purple Halloween lights. Get inspired watching The Nightmare Before Christmas, Beetlejuice, and other fun Halloween movies!

Set the scene with a spooky entrance to your party spaceCourtesy of Rachel Barash

Hold a Costume Contest

Make sure all your guests come in costume. Have some random props on hand in case guests come unprepared. You can hold a contest and give out awards for the wackiest, most creative, scariest, funniest, and all-out best costumes. The awards can be as simple as a bag of candy corn or as complicated as a posed and painted dollar store skeleton with a sash (pictured below), depending on how much time you have and how creative you want to get.

Best Costume AwardCourtesy of Mizerella

Set up a Selfie Booth

Nothing says party like a selfie booth! Put up a black cloth as a backdrop and label the area with a sign that says "Selfie Booth". Assemble all the props you can gather from around the house, including funny hats, foam fingers, fake eyeglasses, Hawaiian leis, bubbles, fake mustaches, and other things that may count as junk any other day of the year. Download printable photo booth props that are fun, superhero themed, or that may help complete your costumes. Mount the props on sturdy cardboard or foam core, cut them out, and duct tape them to a wooden dowel like a not-separated pair of wooden chopsticks to use as a handle. Create a party hashtag or a snapchat group so your guests can all share the fun with each other.

A selfie booth will be the highlight of your partyCourtesy of Partiesonline.au

Scary Snacks

Prepare spooky snacks like Brain Jello. If you are ambitious and have a LOT of time on your hands, a tasty bowl of jello worms, pictured below, will really freak out your party guests. Note that if you're planning on making these, you'll need to start making them at least 24 hours before the party.

Bowl of Jell-o wormsCourtesy of OneLittleProject

Ordinary food items can be spooky if you give them Halloween-themed names. Hot dogs become monster fingers. Spaghetti and meatballs becomes guts and eyeballs. Label chili "guts" and serve it with chips labeled "gut scrapers". Mini mozzarella balls (called "boccioni" in grocery stores) also make great eyeballs, especially when topped with a sliced black olive and speared with a red toothpick.

One big party favorite is to serve guacamole pouring out of the mouth of a pumpkin. It's a delicious treat, if your guests have the guts to try it!

Pumpkin guacamole gutsCourtesy of Amees Savory Dish

Or set out a popcorn bar where your guests can grab a bowl and mix in their favorite treats!

DIY Halloween Popcorn BarCourtesy of Indulgy

Party Activities

What's in the body bag? Place objects in a bag and ask your guests to reach inside the bag to identify the objects. Peeled grapes coated in cooking oil feel like squishy eyeballs. Popcorn kernels feel just like teeth. Corn husk silks feel like human hair. A peeled, canned tomato feels like a heart. An uncooked won ton wrapper feels like skin. What other body part feel-alikes can you imagine? 

Guess how many? Fill a small jar with candy corn. Count how many candy corn there are, write down the number, and keep it in a safe place. Place the jar at the entrance to the party alongside a pen and pad of sticky notes. Label the jar: "How many candy corns are in the jar? Guess right and win the jar!" Ask guests to write their name and their best guess. Award the jar to the winner at the end of the party.

Ask Zombie. Dare your guests to have their fortunes told by a zombie. Have a parent dress up as a zombie (or mummy, or fortune teller). Set the scene with a table in a dark corner covered with a dark cloth. Place a flickering electric candle on the table and set an eerie scene. Print out a fortune teller printable and fold it into the shape of a cootie catcher. 

A fortune teller lends a fun eerie air to your partyCourtesy of Pablo Enriquez from Apartment Therapy