My Son's 8 Year Birthday

Any chance of having it early and making it a Holloween Birthday with costumes. Keep the food simple but quirky like hot dog mummies with blood punch and have it at a time that is off mealtime so you dont have to feed everybody. You can invite everyone "after dinner" and they wont expect too much food.Maybe an uncle or friend can dress up like a Mummy to deliver the presents or you could make trails throughout the house to his gifts and make them out of different things like candy corn or those eyeball candies. Make a special tombstone with his name birthday etc as a souvenier.Cant wait to hear the other ideas.

Hi! Maybe this will help you... when my son was about that age we did a family party at the community room at my ex-husband's place. Brainstorm...maybe you know someone who lives in a community with access to this type of space. It is usually free or very cheap (often homeowner's association type dues cover for resident usage). I know at his grandparents condo they also had one of these spaces. You have to reserve in advance. For my son's party I bought at the party store a small helium tank with balloons and streamers and decorated the room myself. We borrowed a kareoke machine from someone, and that was lots of (free) fun. I think I did finger foods and cake; but if your budget won't allow that maybe you could do it as potluck. Alternatively, one year my son didn't want cake - he was really into Little Debbie cupcakes so that's what we did (the kids loved it). The Dollar Tree usually has plates, napkins, and cups; but you may be limited as far as color there. Also at Dollar Tree are packets of invitations, and lots of little toys that you could use for goody bags (if you even do those - totally optional in my opinion). They also have mylar balloons they can inflate for you, if you want those. Times are tight for everyone; just do what you can and people will be happy to celebrate with you. Enjoy your son's big day!

If he enjoys Beach, then you can do at the Beach. The inexpensive places are public parks and Beach .. but if he hates outdoor, then you might do a scavenger hunt indoors. It might be more work for you to make the scavenger hunt and then clean the house after the party.

Host a party at your house. It's cool inside for the adults and perhaps a sprinkler keeping the children laughing and playing outside for a while. Also, ask that your relatives bring a dish to share...a "pot luck"...or make suggestions...who makes the best salad, pasta, fruit platter...keep it simple and ask prople to help. Save money on paper plates by using your regular dishes. Balloons are inexpensive and always make the birthday special.
Many good wishes for a happy birthday!

There is an indoor miniature golf course in Valrico/Bloomingdale, it is right off of Bloomingdale next to Big Lots. The prices are only about $6.00 a game and I know they do parties, they also have video game rentals so you could have kids doing multiple activities. Other than that outdoors are the only other suggestions I have. Good luck!

BOWLING!!!! They have bumper rails if the kids have never been and most bowling alleys have some type of birthday packages that aren't very expensive and usually include a pizza!

Good Luck on finding the right party adventure!

games! board games, card games, wii games, etc. You can have different games going and people can get in on whatever they want. Jenga is always fun. The point really is spending that time celebrating with the people you love, and games really bring people together.
Order some pizza or grill up some burgers and hot dogs. Couple bags of chips, some cake and you're all set. He won't care how much money you spend as long as you have fun together. Have fun!

Y.:

I really expensive party is a pizza party. You can have the kids make their own personal pizza. It was hit for me when i arranged for my daughter to have a baking party. I found a lot of exoensive items on Oriental trading and I spent about $100 on everything including the balloons and paty favors. You can have games related to pizza like pin the pepperoni on the pizza. You can buy a poster board and draw a pizza and then cut out the pepperoni with each child name to stick on the pizza with double sided tape. You can also have the place setting for each child by writing their name on menu cards or recipe cards. I hope these ideas inspire you. I love the joy in kids birthday parties.

A good idea is look at Butterfly Dreams theme parties for kids, there website is www.ButterflyDreamsparty.com
they do parties for boys and girls and for your sons age you can do a pirate party and there prices are really good, they bring everything for the kids so you dont have to go and buy it.
There phone no is ###-###-####
and they will give you ideas for your sons age group and after they leave your can continue your party with your family. Good luck and hope it helps.

You could do what my family does. They call everyone up and invite them over and ask them to bring their favorite dish. The person having the party usually has the cake, ice cream, drinks and makes a couple of dishes. Works out great and it takes the pressure off of the one having the party. That way everyone has at least one thing they know their family will eat to. Not only do they do this for Birthdays, but they do the passing dishes for Funerals, Weddings, Anniversaries, etc....

Ok....well, we did a "carnival party" for my kids (2 of them are 2 years and 1 day apart)...originally, we did the first one outside, but a couple years later we did it just for my son (the younger of the two) and did it inside in very small base housing overseas. So, we set up simple games as different stations (you could have the adult relatives man each of the stations) and had things like a bean bag toss, drop the clothespin, dime toss onto plates, pin the tail on the "whatever" (donkey, nose on the clown, hat on the farmer...whatever) and we awarded "birthday bucks" for the games. What's good is that you can use all sorts of recyclable materials for the containers you need for the games. Then, at the end of the games I just had 3 prizes and the one with the most birthday bucks got the first prize, and so on...The kids had a blast!

Another party we did was a Play-doh party....bought Playdoh, set up table outdoors and they had fun making all kinds of creations-each got to take one home that they made....and they got a couple mini playdohs in their goodie bag....we also made mini pizzas on english muffins...fun, fun, fun!