Easy Do-able Glow in the Dark Party Ideas
Planning a GLOW party? Here are our favorite Glow in the Dark birthday party activities to use for an easy to set up celebration!!
Glow in the Dark Party Activities
Let’s dive into each party activity and give you more details!
1. Play Glow in the Dark BINGO
We downloaded Bingo cards from Etsy with four per page. There are tons of Bingo board options to choose from.
Next we printed them out and gave each kid a neon highlighter and a metal pizza pan (from the Dollar store) to write on top of. We also turned OFF the lights and turned ON our black lights to make the ambiance extra fun.
We had my teenagers help lead Bingo while we waited for all the guests to arrive.
2. Introduce the GLOWCADE (Glow in the Dark arcade)
Once all the kids arrive, we let them know that they’d be working in team to make a Glow in the Dark arcade!
Next, we introduced the supplies that they’d have available for creating their arcade:
- Glow in the Dark tape
- Glow sticks
- Cardboard boxes (we got these at Home Depot and Ace Hardware- sizes XL and M)
- Neon Straws
- Neon cups
- Glow in the Dark streamers
- Neon paper
- Scissors
- Cardboard tubes
- Tape (we had clear packing tape and regular clear tape)
- Highlighters
3. Break into teams to make the glow in the dark arcade.
Next we broke the party guests into groups of 2-3 and we sent each group to a different part of the downstairs area. Each group was invited to send one person to come to grab supplies at the supplies table.
We didn’t give them any examples or ideas, but you could show the kids a few minutes of this Cain’s Arcade video as a quick example if you think your party guests might need ideas.
Each group was given two boxes, one XL and one medium along with whatever they wanted to select from the supply station.
4. Play the Arcade Games
After the party guests worked on building their arcade games with the lights on for about an hour and a half, we cleaned up and turned OFF all the lights, and turned ON the black lights.
Kids then roamed around and tried everyone’s games for about 10-15 minutes.
They came up with so many great ideas!
5. Make and eat pizza
We didn’t want to stop the arcade creating to eat dinner, so we had kids come in shifts of 3-4 to have snacks (chips & popcorn) and come make homemade pizza. Then kids ate their pizza and went back to creating their arcade games. There were always about 5-6 kids at the snack station throughout the party getting drinks and food when they needed it.
6. Eat Cookie Cake
Not everything at a Glow in the Dark party, needs to glow! My son wanted a basic chocolate chip cookie cake for his birthday treat! It was delicious.
If you want to make the cake match the theme, you could add Glow in the Dark frosting (just mix this into white buttercream frosting) or glow sprinkles.
We didn’t have time to eat the cake at the party, so we sang Happy Birthday and then cut it up and sent pieces home with the kids when they left! The arcade games were too much fun to stop for treats!
7. Give out a Glow in the Dark party favor
Before the kids left, each one got a simple glow in the dark party favor as they walked out the door. It was hard to get the kids the leave, so it was nice to have something fun to hand them!
8. Dress up in neon or a glow in the dark outfit!
One final thing to mention is that we invited our party guests to wear their favorite neon or glow in the dark shirts and accessories.
We used Glow in the Dark tape to add the number 12 to my son’s white t-shirt so that he looked festive for his 12 year old Glow in the Dark party! He also wore some glow stick accessories.
