Seasonal

12 Tips for Hosting a Halloween Party

Wickedly Fun and Festive Halloween Party Ideas

From child-friendly activities to dinner parties for adults, Halloween is a great time to dress up in a costume and celebrate. Though it’s a time of tricks and treats, planning a gathering at home for family and friends doesn’t have to be tricky. With October fast approaching, it’s time to start planning for your Halloween party to ensure all your guests have a wicked good time. Once you’ve set a time and place for your spooky shindig, you’ll want to incorporate some themed activities, entertainment, and festive food to make your party the talk of the neighborhood. Here’s some tips for hosting your next Monster Bash.

Halloween Treats

1. Halloween-themed food and desserts

Every party needs a variety of satisfying appetizers, main dishes, and desserts to ensure your guests are well-fed. Why not put a Halloween-themed spin on them? Here’s just a few ideas to get your creative juices flowing:

 

    • Add sliced pimento olives to deviled eggs for creepy eyeballs

 

    • Arrange cheese cut into thin strips on pizzas to look like a spiderwebs or cut the cheese into ghost, pumpkin, or other shapes using cookie cutters; Add bugs and spiders made from olives

 

    • Make jack-o’-lantern chicken pot pie using a carved pumpkin cookie cutter on the pastry dough that goes on top

 

    • Create fun finger sandwiches by cutting the bread into Halloween-themed shapes like bats, pumpkins, ghosts, and witch’s hats

 

    • Serve candied or caramel apples with creepy gummy worms next to the popsicle stick

 

    • Turn cakes, doughnuts, or other pastry, into monsters, cats, or other critters with candy corn, M&Ms, licorice, and other small candy pieces

 

  • Make a graveyard sheet cake using crumbled chocolate cookies to create the dirt on top—then add cookie tombstones, gummy worms, and white chocolate bones

Pro tip: Fill cupcakes or cakes with strawberry preserves so they “bleed” when you cut into them.

Halloween Cocktails

2. Serve creepy cocktails

Every great Halloween party needs BOO-zy adult cocktails and kid-friendly drinks. Make sure you serve a variety of both at your fright fest. Make punch or mulled cider in a cauldron rather than your regular punch bowl. Use eyeball- or skull-shaped ice. Add fun garnishes to your drinks like plastic spiders, olive eyeballs, and novelty swizzle sticks. Serve beverages in decorative glassware with Halloween motifs make your cocktails look especially chilling.

Pro tip: Add food-grade dry ice to your punch bowl to make your cauldron steam.

3. Set a Halloween-themed table

Dress your dining room table with themed table linens (table cloths, table runners, and napkins) in Halloween colors and designs. Set places with dinnerware designed for the season (check out this Scaredy Cat collection). Add a creepy black candelabra with dripping candles, a pumpkin or plastic skull filled with flowers, or some candle lanterns with mice and bat accents arranged around them for a centerpiece.

Indoor Halloween Decor

4. Create a Haunted house

Whether you choose creepy or cute, your decorations will help set the stage for a frightfully fun event. Jack-o’-lanterns, ghosts, spiders, witches, werewolves, vampires, demons, and other characters can all be incorporated into your space. Deck out your whole house indoors and outdoors for spooky fun.

Pro tip: Rent a smoke or fog machine to add an air of mystery to your party.

5. Mood-setting music playlist

Set the right mood with the right tunes. Classics like “Thriller” and “Monster Mash” will raise the dead and get them on the dance floor. Use streaming services or put together a selection of CDs to enjoy some curated playlists.

Halloween Lighting

6. Set the scene with lighting

Most of us imagine Halloween as dark, mysterious, and scary, so you’ll want your party atmosphere to be the same. Rather than keeping your house fully lit, dim the lights and add candles, strobe lights, or black, purple, orange, or red-colored light bulbs to keep the party interesting and set the mood for the fun.

7. Costume contest

Halloween is all about costumes, so invite guests to dress up for the occasion. You can suggest costumes to match your party’s theme or let guests surprise you with their own choices. You can stage a contest with small prizes for the scariest, funniest, most inventive, or other categories. You can select a panel of judges or have the guests submit their votes for the winners.

8. Scary scavenger hunt

Hide treats or small prizes throughout the house and send guests on a scavenger hunt to find them. You can provide of list of items they need to find - the first person to check them all off is the winner. You can also hide a larger prize and have guests hunt through a series of clues that helps them discover its location.

Halloween Costumes

9. Be social

Create a hashtag exclusive to your party and encourage guests to post photos of your fun event on social media. After the party’s over, everyone can scroll through and re-live the fun.

Pro tip: Supply disposable cameras to encourage guests to capture great candid shots.

10. Eerie entertainment

Host a movie party with a selection of fan-favorite flicks and thrillers. Ply your guests with plenty of snacks, dim the lights, and watch a scary movie on the big screen. You can preselect the movie(s) or invite guests to bring their own choice of films. Campy classics such as “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” lets guests join in on action to add to the fun.

11. Murder mystery

Turn your party into a mystery “whodunit” where party-goers have to figure out who killed the designated victim. Guests can be assigned characters to play with backstory information given to each attendee in their invitations. Costumes can be suggested and the venue can be decorated based on the time period and circumstances of the crime.

Halloween Treats

12. Guest gifts and goody bags

Candy isn’t just for kids. Provide your attendees with their own version of trick or treat goodies. Put together small gift bags for each guest filled with chocolate, hard candy, and fun trinkets as a party favor.

Now that you have some ideas for hosting the best Halloween bash, you can begin planning this year’s event. Put together your guest lists, get some invitations, and get ready to party. Browse our Halloween Shop at Riverbend Home to find themed products to ensure your guests have a screamingly good time.