Bounce Houses and Other Great Birthday Party Ideas for Kids

If you are a parent (or you remember what it was like when you were a kid), you know that the whole year is looking forward to just a few things (besides, of course, the weekend!) Christmas/holidays as the end of the year, and your birthday!

Knowing this, it’s important for parents to take a birthday seriously and make sure it lives ups to the kids expectations. We aren’t attempting to spoil the child, but we are attempting to provide the recognition and appreciation that will help the kid feel good about themselves.

But what are the ideas for a good party and celebration? Let’s face it, kids can be simple creatues. Give them a yard to play in, some pizza and some baloons and I’m sure they’ll be good to go. However let’s try to get a little creative. If you enjoy planning events for adults, you can get the same enjoyment (and even moreso), in planning an event for your kid.

So without further ado, let’s look at some ideas for creative birthday party ideas for kids!

#1 – Bounce Houses

If your neighborhood is anything like mine, you’ll see an indoor bounce house at least once a month in the backyards of your neighbors. These things are incredibly popular, with plenty of options for renting bounce houses for a few hours or the whole day. The kids love them, and they are a big attraction for all the little friends and neighbors to come spend time at the party. If you organize parties very often, you can consider buying one through bounce house wholesale.

Some things to keep in mind, you want to always keep an eye on the bounce house, don’t treat it like a baby sitter. A kid might fall down, or two kids might bump into one another, and you want an adult nearby at all times just to be sure.

Nowadays there are more than just a bouncy castle, they also have additional features like slides, obstacle courses, or summertime features like wet slides. Check your local rental company to see what the options are.

Of course, you could always buy your own, but how often would you use it? 2-4 times a year? Probably best just to rent once a year for a few years, then you won’t have a few hundred pounds of rubber, an inflater pump and various other junk taking up space in your garage. You can also do a water slide. Check out Water Slide Rentals North Port, FL!

#2 – Inflatable Movie Screen

Now we are getting creative. The inflatable rental market is ballooning (no pun intended) to includes lots of other stuff besides bounce houses. Once of the more interesting ones is the inflatable movie screen. If you have a big enough backyard, you can turn it into your own outdoor cinema! Throw on “Frozen” or the latest/greatest kids movie, and watch as the kids are enthralled by the larger than life movie experience right in front of them.

Remember how I said you can’t treat a bounce house as a baby sitter? Well, in the case of the movie screen, you can! It will give both the parents and the kids some down time.

Fill in with some snacks, popcorn (a lot of inflatable rental companies will also have party rental equipment such as a popcorn machine, cotton candy machine, etc), and you’ve got yourself some happy and content kiddies!

#3 – Scavenger Hunt

Ok, this one is more involved, but if you are the kind of person that likes planning things, it’s probably the most fun and exciting.

This works best when on a large property or in a park setting. Adult scavenger hunts can go all over the city, but obviously with kids you’ll want them contained within a specific area.

Also keep in mind this is likely to work best with kids 7 years old and older. Not that younger kids wouldn’t enjoy it, but they might not understand exactly what is going on. Somewhat older kids, however, will really love the intrigue!

It can also work with larger groups of kids, except you’ll want to split them into teams and have an adult to chaperone each team.

When planning a scavenger hunt, the trick is to think of it like a mystery novel. Kids will absolutely love to try and solve a mystery. Leave clues around the area, leading kids to hunt down and find things, in order to get to the next clue.

One trick I love, have an adult play the role of a character. The kids have to find the character and ask him/her questions to get to the next clue. If you have a good actor in your adult group, this is even better. If you’ve ever played an RPG video game, and have to interview a wise man or a shaman, this is kind of like that. Cool right?

Need more scavenger hunt ideas, check out this article.

#4 – Carnival Games

Here is another great one that will make the kids feel like they went an amusement park (but for much less money). There are plenty of great games you can think of that don’t cost that much, such as:

Water balloon toss (like egg toss, but less gross!)
Bag race (just need some burlap sacks and you are good to go)
Three-legged Race (pair adults with kids to get everyone involved in the fun)

If you want to spend a little more money and add in some more games, lots of party rental companies will have different carnival style games you can use, such as:

Football/baseball target practice
Wack-a-mole style games
Can-smash style games

You can get the idea. Normally these games are less expensive than bigger rentals like bounce houses, so it might be a good option to spice up the birthday party.

Conclusion

Thanks for reading! We hope these ideas what to do instead of a bounce house will help you set up an outstanding party for the kids (and the adults) to enjoy!

Courtney P.

I’m a 20-something stay-at-home mother and wife. I have an amazing husband, a beautiful daughter, two loving dogs, and a lazy cat. I wouldn’t change my life for anything! I love to read, listen to music, cook and blog!