Easy and Fun Tween Birthday Ideas

What words stuck out to you in the title, Easy and Fun Tween Birthday Ideas?  If easy was one of them then this is the post for you!  Here is where I am with birthday parties.  If you love to do elaborate Pinterest themed parties, more power to you.  But if you don’t, let me just release you from the pressure to make that happen!  I spent my kids early birthday parties feeling like I should make them like the picture perfect posts I saw online.  But all that lead to was stress with a side of grumpy mom.  And guess what?  My kids didn’t really care about perfect themed food.  They just wanted to be with their friends, eat cake and open presents!  So if you are with me in keeping birthdays easy but still fun, then keep reading!!

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Active Tween Party Ideas

So one of the things that can take up so much time and energy is figuring out what to actually do during a birthday party.  I honestly don’t mind setting up some games at home, but there are seasons of life that I just don’t have the space to make that happen.  So one option that has worked great for us is to take the kids to an activity or event for part of the party. 

Sometimes the whole party could be at the event.  For example, my son had his last birthday at a local trampoline park.  There are bounce houses, art studios, arcades and more that will host birthday events.  I know these tend to be more expensive, but you can often find deals if you use Groupon or if you are willing to do your party during a time other than their peek hours.

Don’t forget about other locations that don’t offer official birthday party packages.  For example, for my daughters birthday we took her and three friends to an indoor pool!  It cost under $30 for her friends and my other kids to swim! Ask your child about activities they enjoy doing and plan to take your party there.  This can also help you keep the guest list in check because it just isn’t easy to transport a large group anywhere! 

Here are a few more ideas my kids or their friends have done

– Ice Skating

-Put Put Golf

-Park

-Bowling

 Active Game Ideas:

If going somewhere just won’t work or if you are doing a sleepover and there is no way around a group of kids needing a little entertainment in your house, I have some simple games for you.  My goal with games is that they aren’t expensive and they won’t take a massive amount of work for me to prep.  We have found a few tried and true favorites! 

Syran Wrap Ball– My girls ask to play this at every birthday party.  Seriously.  Every.  Single.  One.  Apparently it doesn’t get old.  Basically you wrap up all kids of small prizes (chapsticks, rings, candy, fidgits etc.)  in a giant syran wrap ball.  Then player roll a dice and try to get double while the person behind them is trying to unwrap the ball.  If they unwrap a prize they get to keep it.  Once the person rolling gets doubles they grab the ball and the next person starts rolling.  If you want more detailed directions and pictures you can check out this post from The Chaos and the Clutter. 

Minute to Win it Games– These are another great option.  Most of them are simple and don’t require a lot of materials.  We have done one when you have to work together to keep three balloons in the air for one minute.  It was actually harder than it sounds!  Here is a post to some more ideas from Happiness is Homemade. 

Or my aunt got us THIS game for Christmas this year.  It is basically 237 minute to win it games with the materials needed included!!  We have had fun with it as a family and I have already picked a few favorites to play at future birthday parties!! 

Food Challenges– my kids have had lots of giggles over trying silly foods.  Have you heard of the Oreo and Mustard challenge?  We tried some oreos with mustard and then we branched out to other silly options to dip our oreos in too! 

We have also done a food challenge with our Slamwich card game.  My oldest daughter came up with this and I wasn’t sure at first, but they actually had a lot of fun with it!  Basically each person had to turn over four cards and then actually make a sandwich with those ingredients and take a bite.  They laughed so hard!!

Relaxing Ideas

I think it is always good to have some more calm activities for the end of the night, especially if you are having a sleepover!  Tweens aren’t going to go from Minute to Win it games right to quietly sleeping so it helps to slow down the pace before bedtime!

Movies- Movies are a great end of the evening option.  We always have the birthday child pick a movie out before hand so there isn’t any squabbles about what movie to watch.  We love to get our PJs on first and then snuggle up with blankets or sleeping bags so kids are in the sleeping frame of mind!  Sometimes if you are lucky a few kids will actually fall asleep during the movie too!

Crafts- I am all on board with simple crafts.  You could have them all do a directed drawing from Art for Kids Hub (LOVE them!!)  Or for one party, we had a simple paint by number like THESE for each child.  Other easy options could be bracelet making or Scratch Art.

 Other ideas could be calm printable games like Bingo, Word Searches or Word Scrambles.  You can make your own or search the internet!

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