Okay Despite all belief to the contrary, Splatoon, the atypical first person shooter game managed to win the Turf War for our hearts, and permanently splatter a place in your children’s minds. That also explains why you’ve been hearing your child talk about Squid Sisters, Cap’n Cuttlefish, horse shoe crabs, shrimp and ink – (just like that, your dream of having a marine biologist in the family is shattered).

On the upside, you now have a pretty nifty theme for your child’s upcoming birthday party – it even allows you to put your puny punning skills to the tests (with in game place names like Inkopolis, OctoValley, and weapons like the Bamboozler gun…which is made out of – surprise, surprise – bamboo shoots).

If you’re feeling like a squid out of water, particularly with all the game lingo, or you’re just looking for some extra ideas to plan the perfect birthday bash, then don’t be afraid to splatter through the article below. There are plenty of Splatoon birthday party ideas from decorations down to party favors here to create a Splatastic party they’ll never forget.

Splatoon Birthday Party Invitations and Ideas

Once you’re committed to the theme, you need to start out with the basics – the invites. 

*Free Printable Splatoon birthday invitations
With a little ink and some cardstock paper you can utilise these free printable Splatoon birthday invitations. Simply, Add in the details and print.

*Free Printable Splatoon thank you cards
Thank you cards are great for letting guests know that you appreciated them coming to celebrate your big day with you. Use these free printable Splatoon thank you cards to do just that. 

*Custom Splatoon party invites
You can always order your cards on Etsy – they can even personalize them by adding the image of your child on the card.

Splatoon Birthday Party Decorations and Ideas

With the invitations sent out in all the corners of Inkopolis, it’s time to prepare Inkopolis Plaza for the Splatfest. While the word Splatfest might sound horrifying to any parent (who hasn’t returned to find paint/food/crayon remains in places you thought were physically impossible for a child to reach) the aim of the game is to simply deck out your living room with game based decorations (phew).

*Color Scheme
There isn’t a main or unifying color theme to the game, but they do like to use bright colors for the ink splats – you’re safe with any bright variation of green, orange, blue, pink etc.

*DIY Splatoon Birthday Banner 
String together some letters that read “happy birthday” with this free Splatoon birthday banner template. Just print, cut and string together to make your own Splatoon themed decor. 

*Free Printable Welcome Sign
 Use this free printable Splatoon welcome sign template to make a welcome sign for the party. Print and frame the sign somewhere everyone can see. 

*Splat decoration ideas
Luckily, if there is one thing that the game does well, (beside keep your child occupied for hours on end) it’s providing you with a decoration theme that can be used on anything (and I do mean anything), namely, the ‘splat’ – or ‘splatter’.

*Splatter wall
If you don’t mind adding some more permanent changes to the house, here is how you can make a paint splatter wall.

*DIY Squid Tassles
Some other simple ideas, before we go into the SuperCraft section, involves making wall hangers – either with splat shapes or using different colored Splatoon squid shapes. You can also hang some squid tassles – use the tutorial and add some eyes with white and black felt to the top of the tassel.

*DIY Splatoon Suction Bomb 
On to more complicated designs, we tread firmly into the DIY territory with Splatoon Suction bombs – using a tin can, printable labels (to be found in the description below the video) a plunger and lights – yes, you’re going to light up a plunger (one of life’s great accomplishments).

*Judd the Cat Paper lantern

And if you like the cat theme, you can also make a Judd the cat paper lantern using a hello kitty paper lantern model and instead of the cut outs, have the ears, eyes, nose and mouth from this model. You can even add a tail with a bit of grey colored rope.

Splatoon Birthday Party Table Setup

Inkopolis Plaza is not complete without the food court, and therefore the party table setup. Carrying on the proud tradition from the section above, feel free to splat anything that strikes your fancy.

*Splatter Tablecloth 
The easiest way to do would be a splatter table cloth (especially if there is an old one you were looking forward to getting rid of). You know the drill, grab the cloth, the dye and the brushes and have fun.

*DIY Splatoon Squid Plushies
Apart from splats, Splatoon is rife with squids – so it’s time to put on your DIY gloves and get to work – you can squid it! You can make your own Splatoon squid plushy and spread some on the table – if you can bear to be parted from the adorable ‘squidlings’.You can even add them to goodie bags as party favors.

*DIY Squid coasters 
Alternatively, use the same idea to make some nice squid coasters – print the template, glue it on cardboard and cut.

*Paint Splat Plates, Cups, Napkins
To serve food on, there are paint splat party plates, cups and napkins available from Amazon. The design is perfect for a Splatoon themed party. It features colorful paint splats of red, green, yellow, orange etc on a white background.

Splatoon Birthday outfits/Costume Ideas

Your house is not the only thing that gets the full make-over – your children get to enjoy it as well. The best Splatoon costume you can make for them rests on one key element – the Inkling’s hair/tentacles. There are lots of costumes and Inkling hats available for purchase. But if you feel your DIY muses stirring, you can make the costumes yourself.

*DIY Inkling Hat 
A great way to start is with the Inkling boy hat

– and if that one is not clear enough, here is another tutorial. As long as you have felt/cloth and some mad sewing skills you can’t go wrong with this one.

*Inkling Makeup tutorial
To round off the look, here’s how you can do Inkling make-up – complete with colorful eyebrows. As for the costume itself, you need black stretchy shorts, a white t-shirt, brightly colored sneakers, goggles and some giant headphones (basically, your average sporting teen look).

*Inkling fangs
For the extra bit of ‘je ne sais quoi’ you can throw in a pair of (tiny) vampire teeth – Inklings tend to have some sharp fangs.

*Judd the Cat Costume Ideas
On to more specific characters, if your child loves fuzzy furrballs you can make his or her day by having a Judd the cat costume. You will need some cat ears (which you can buy or make yourself), a cat tail (or some bit of grey rope), a pair of suspenders and white and grey body paint (Judd is white with a grey spot over the left eye and ear, and a splatter of grey at the corner of the mouth).

*Spyke Costume Ideas
You can also make Spyke with the aid of a purple wig – make sure to add some light purple or pink splotches towards the hair tips. For the prickly look of the character, here’s a tutorial on how to spike a wig. Add a multi colored poncho, green pants and some sandals and you’re set.

*Annie the ShopKeeper Costume Ideas
You can even make one of the shopkeepers, like Annie. Just use the same spiking technique from above on a red wig with bright green hair ends. As for the get up, add some big square glasses, giant pink headphones, black army boots, orange leggings with black squids, a green dress and a tie dye jacket. For the orange leggings with the black squids you can use a squid stamp (available in shops) and some black clothing dye – like in this video. And here’s how you can make your own tie dye jacket.

Splatoon Birthday Party Food and drinks

Saving Inkopolis and rescuing the Zapfish in Octo Valley from the Octarians tends to work up quite an appetite.

*Splatoon food labels
To label the delicious food that you are going to make for your Splatoon themed party use these free printable Splatoon food labels. Simply print, cut, fold, write in the name of the food and place next to dish for display.

*Splat Shaped cookies and sandwiches
With a small army of Inklings to feed you can always rely on some of the basics – like splat shaped cookies or sandwiches that were cut with a splatter cookie cutter (Amazon or Etsy are your best friends).

*Splatoon Froyo
Nintendo also gives some nice food tips – you can make some Splatoon froyo like Squidsicle (mango, popsicle sorbet) or Inkberry (strawberry frozen yogurt).

*Jelly Fresh
You can add some Jelly Fresh – made from, surprise, surprise – jell-o shots (have them in bright greens, blues, pink).

*Pretzel Tentacles 
 For more finger food, make some Candy coated pretzel tentacles – yumm.

*Paint Splatter cake pops 
Another Splatoon party food idea is to add a cake in the mix – pun very much intended. Why not try your hand at Ink splatter cake pops – they look great, they are easy to grab and eat (you’ll just have to put up with popsicle stick mysteriously appearing under your feet for some days after the party). You can also make some sponge cake, cut it and label it Sponge Block Cubes (Inklings can use these to block attacks from the Octarians) – you can even add some frosting / dipping cream to the side (brightly colored, as always) and dub it Squid Ink (those protector cubes tend to expand when hit by Squid Ink and contract when hit by Octarian Ink).

*Splatter Hot Dogs
For something that is not bathed in sugar, you can have splatter hot dogs – have your guests splatter them with mustard and ketchup (to make it more attractive, you can add some food colorant in them).

*Squid Pizza
You can also try your hand at making some Squid Pizza (which will contain no actual squid in it, thankfully). Bake a round pizza and add some tentacles to it (thin strips of pizza with olives or pepperoni in a single file) – it should look something like this.

*Ink Drinks
We shouldn’t forget to add some drinks, to help all that food go down more easily. You can always serve the drinks as ink (orange, pink, blue, lime green colors). To add a bit more ‘splatter’ – make some inked ice cubes (water and food colorant) and pair off opposite color drinks and ice cubes (purple with orange, for instance).

*Splatoon water bottles
You can also serve bottled drinks too and use these free Splatoon water bottle labels to match drinks to your theme. 

*Splatoon Nutella Chocolate Milkshake 
For a super special tasty treat that is bound to make your dentist faint, try these fantastic Splatoon nutella chocolate milk shakes that have splatter toppings and a fondant squid on top – this desert is Splatastic.

Splatoon Birthday Cake and Cupcake Decorating Ideas

The Cap’n Cuttlefish of the food court is the birthday cake. You can always order one from the cake decoration shops or try your hand at making one yourself. You don’t have to slave all day over the stove and have mad decoration skills like Buddy Valastro to end up with a nice looking Splatoon themed cake.

*Splatoon Edible Cake image Toppers 
The easiest way to decorate any cake is with an edible cake image topper. Ebay is a great place to look for these toppers. Right now, there are lots of cool Splatoon cake image toppers available there, which can also be personalized depending on the sellers options. 

*Splatoon Cake Idea
For another simple version that still looks amazing, like this, you need to bake two cakes – a large square one and a smaller round one. For the decoration, cover the bottom cake with chocolate sprinkles and the top cake with overlaying bits of brightly colored fondant. From the leftover fondant, cut out small splat shapes and circles and glue them on top of the colorful fondant mosaic with some edible glue. To make the upright splat shapes, use a splat shape template and cut out rice crispies that you then cover in fondant or brightly colored glaze.

*Splatoon Splat and Squid Cake 
Here’s another simple cake, complete with the cake recipe – just follow the tutorial.

*Splatter Cake
You can also make a giant splatter cake – it will look like a paint ball impact and it’s not that difficult to accomplish.

*Splattershot JR cake 
Leveling up, you can try your hand at a Splattershot(jr) cake – if you’re confident in your cake shaping skills. It’s based on a Nerf Gun cake tutorial – just make sure to color it mostly grey with purple.

*Rainbow Cupcakes
We should also not forget to add in cupcakes – here are some nice Splattered Cupcakes (rainbow cupcakes) or you can try your hand with cake mix, frosting and ganache to make this version.

*Splatoon Cupcake decorations and wrappers 
To really have your cupcakes matching the theme, why not use these free printable Splatoon cupcake toppers and wrappers to dress up your cupcakes ready for the party.  

Splatoon Birthday Party Games and activities

If you’re looking to entertain your Inklings, then why not follow the example of the game and organize a Splatoon Splatfest – divide the children into teams and have them fight it out with super soakers (the driest, obviously, wins).

Another fun way to use Splattershots (super soakers, in plain English), you can play a round of send the Octarian over the edge. It’s a variation of a beach ball soaker race – where the beach ball in question gets a tentacle tattoo on it, to make it resemble the Octarians. The aim is to use the water in the soakers to push the ‘Octarians’ over the line – whoever clears Inkopolis fastest wins.

You can also play a variation of tag (but with super soakers – everything is better with them). One child will have to be the Octarian that hunts the Inklings. When they get hit with a burst of ink (water) the person becomes the new Octarian (and gets to splat some revenge). Another variation is to play freeze tag, where the hit Inkling is frozen on the spot until a team mate crawls through their legs. The game ends when all Inklings are frozen.

Another Splatoon party game idea is to replicate a Turf War in your own backyard – this idea involves more than just water…it has colored water (and the promise of a rainbow garden to tend to, at the end of it). Fortunately, (since no one wants to remove dye splatters out of clothes) the aim of the game is not to hit each other, but a certain territory (which you can cover in white cloth). Split the children into teams, give them Super Soakers containing water colored with food dye, grab two giant strips of cloth and time the event – whoever colors the most out of their own turf, before the time runs out, wins.

The Splatoon game has another battle mode called Splat Zone – which you can also burrow and repurpose to your own ends. It is basically a form of king of the hill with a twist. Since you can’t have children covering massive areas with paint and defending them, you can have two teams that try to capture the flag. Once conquered, the area needs to be kept for 5 minutes. If all members of the conquering team are taken out before the end of the 5 minutes, then they lose.

For another twist on an old favorite, have the children participate in a Zapfish Hunt – Inklings have to retrieve all of the Zapfish from Octo Valley (your backyard). You can have them split into teams and search for a specific number of “Zapfish” – and whoever gets them first wins (or, if you print a Zapfish image on a puzzle, whoever assembles the puzzle first wins).

Lastly, you can also have them try their hand at setting off the Burst Bomb – they stand back to back, with a purple balloon with white stripes in between. The aim is to pop the balloon the fastest, without dropping it.

Splatoon Birthday Party Favors and Ideas

Once the party starts to wind down, you need to have your party favors ready – so that the Inklings remember this Splatfest for years to come.

*DIY Splatoon goodie bags
You can decorate goodie bags with splat shapes or squid shapes, and inside you can have Splatoon tattoos and stickers, badges, figurines or magnets. All of these are available on Amazon or Etsy.

*Free Printable Splatoon favor bag toppers
If you’re planning on providing candy or small favors use this free printable Splatoon favor bag topper template to seal your cellophane bag/paper lunch bag full of treats. 

*DIY Splatoon bottlecap necklaces
If you want to try your hand at making the party favors, you can give the children some Splatoon bottle cap necklaces.

*DIY Splatoon Clay key chains and pens
If you’re not afraid of clay and have time on your hands, you can make key chain rings using this clay Splatoon squid tutorial. There is also one for making a Splatoon pen , also with clay – and the results are stunning.

*DIY Splatoon favor tags  
With some of the above favors in the mix, use these free Splatoon favor tags to make them look even better.

*Nintendo Splatoon character cards
Nintendo is also very helpful in this case, as there are a whole host of character cards available for downloading and printing.

*Splatoon cookies 
Lastly, you need to make sure that the little Inklings don’t run out of fuel before they get to their own corner of Inkopolis, so give them some of the squid cookies you made in the section above.

*DIY Judd the Cat Plushy
You can also make your own Judd the cat plushy – if your fingers – ahem, tentacles – are nimble enough.

Splatoon Birthday Gift Ideas

Inkling gifts are not your only concern (if you’re going for the parent of the year award) – you also need to have something for your own child (something spectacular, on theme, easy to find, not costing an arm and a leg – the ideal gift is looking a bit hard to find). You shouldn’t worry though, since you can never go wrong with themed clothing – there is a plethora of t-shirts available. There are t-shirts with the Squid Sisters, Turf Wars, Only Judd can judge me, Inklings, Splat Squad (you get the drift, more choices than you know what to do with). There are also caps with the squid logo or, even better, Inkling hats (made to look like their hair –tentacles – Medusa has nothing on them). If that is not enough, there are also a multitude of Splatoon hoodies available – to round off your child’s themed garments.

Another Splatoon birthday gift idea is to appeal to the gamer within and get your children the Wii version of the game, or some Splatoon Wii U protector. In fact, while we’re on that topic, there are a lot of Splatoon cover cases, for Smart Phones, Nintendo game stations, you name it. Or if your child likes the hands on approach, get them a Splatoon water gun (and learn to duck).

What was the old Hollywood mantra? If a topics worth making a series of movies over, then it definitely needs a teen high school series – and a few prequels, to be on the safe side (I’m still waiting for the Predator one, Mr. Random Director). Not to be outdone, Disney steps on the bandwagon with its teenage heroes and villains movie – Descendants. If you were wondering what happened to the beloved Disney characters years down the line, well, it seems that real life has caught up to them and they are now average adults with jobs, cars, bills to pay and children… wait, no, that would be a different kind of movie. There is no need to look scared – or bored – the magic is still there, so are the adventures and monster/creature/things – and so are the teenage children of the heroes and villains (though Ursula’s child seems to inconspicuously absent – maybe octopus Goth teen was a bit of a stretch? – pun intended).

If your child is head over heels for the Descendants characters and has started eyeing leather jackets and purple wigs then it might be time to consider throwing a Descendants themed birthday party – that and silently weep for their lost childhood when everything was pink or sparkly and you still had a say in what they wore. Below you’ll find enough Descendants birthday party ideas to make even the most Disney movie clueless parent seem like a connoisseur.

Disney Descendants Birthday Party Invitations & Ideas

Welcome to the creatively named United States of Auradon, in short – USA. This will be your homeland – and the place where all partygoers have to travel to, at the bequest of King Beast and Queen Belle. Fortunately, Disney movies provide plenty of text that can be converted into party invitations.

*Free Descendants birthday invitations
Use these free Descendants party invitation templates to invite all of your guests to the party. Simply print, fill in and send out.

*DIY Magic Mirror invitations
While on that train of thought, you can make “Magic Mirror” invitations using this template – just add some of the text from above, and either an image of your child, or a print of Maleficent.

*Poison Apple Add-ons
Another Descendants party invitation idea is to use the main song/theme that is linked to the movie, namely, “Rotten to the core”. It makes for some nice 3-d paper poison apple add-ons, that you can send along with your invite (just add some purple spray paint to that green apple).

*Personalized Descendants invitations
If you’re on a schedule, you can always find Descendants birthday party invitations on Etsy or the Disney store – some of them can even include the picture of your child on the invites.

*Free Descendants 2 thank you cards
Once the party is over a great way to say thank you to your guests is with thank you cards. Here are some free Descendants 2 thank you cards.

Disney Descendants Birthday Party Decorations & Ideas

With the carrier pigeons on the way, spreading the news to the far corners of your city, it’s time to get ready for the royal feast, after all, the King and Queen should always have their guests in awe at the splendor of their halls. For those of us that don’t live in palaces – or manors, you can find some Descendants birthday party decoration ideas below, to help you spruce up the place.

*Color Scheme
The first thing you need to set up is the color scheme – which in this case is pretty simple – black, purple and green (just like the shades of the main character’s clothing and hair).

*Free Descendants Poster
Once you’ve got your colors sorted, a great way to keep the party walls interesting is with this free Descendants welcome poster.

There are two simple directions that your party can take – for those with a soul “Rotten to the core” (good luck getting that song out of your head now), there is the option to go for a villains themed party which means villainous everything – from chandeliers, to napkins, to chairs.

*Villian Lantern Wraps
You can make easy to make Disney villain’s lantern wraps, using these printables.

*DIY Apple Paper Lantern
If you’re feeling crafty, here’s a simple poison apple paper lantern – you can hang them all throughout the house (and even dim the lights for a more villainous atmosphere). You just need to grab a can of purple spray paint and add splotches to the apple paper lanterns.

*DIY Spellbook Prop
To make your very own Isle of the Lost seem more genuine, you’ll need to add a Grimoire too – (ye olde book of spells, for those that are staring in confusion). Here is a DIY Spell book tutorial – it’s one of our favorites, not only because the book turns up looking so good, but since one of the spells is a recipe for poisoned apples it fits perfectly in line with the theme.

*DIY Hanging Decorations
To round off the evil atmosphere of terror, you can make your own wallhangers of terror (yep, that’s how they are officially named).

*Free Descendants 2 Birthday Banner
To string the perfect message for the birthday boy/girl use this free Descendants birthday banner template to make a Happy birthday banner to display on your walls.

*Castle Decoration Ideas
Another idea for Descendants party decorations would be to go with a castle theme. Fairytale kingdoms all have a castle, and so does Auradon. You can start off with fantastic ceiling decorations using tulle and streamers in purple, green and black. It will make your royal halls – and your ‘chandeliers’ look more impressive. You can even make your own paper torches and chandeliers , to add to the castle look. Spread some Auradon crests here and there and you’re set. 

Disney Descendants Tableware/Party Table Setup

Once your castle/evil lair is all set up, you will need to adorn the feasting table. If you don’t have a lot of time before their big day and your budget permits, or you would simply prefer to have all the tableware ticked of the list at once. There are official Disney Descendants party supplies now available. You can find Disney Descendants plates, napkins, plastic cutlery and other bits and pieces featuring characters from the movie to set the scene for the theme. 

To see all official Disney Descendants party supplies click this image

   Disney Descendants Birthday Party Plates, Cups, Napkins, Balloons and more

However if you want some inspiration to put together your own Descendants party table set up, here are some ideas. Regardless of whether you are going with a villain theme or Auradon theme. The main colors are black, purple and green. For instance, you can have a purple tablecloth with plastic lime green plates and tableware (making that a very ‘evil’ color combination, in the sense that it could be mild headache inducing).

*Free Printable Descendants Cup Wraps 
Disney again comes to the rescue with free printable cup wraps which can be used to dress solid colored supplies.

*Descendants candles and mirror effects
For an added effect, you can place some black candle holders on the table with purple or green candles. If you have a mirror that you don’t mind sacrificing, you can spray paint Mal’s logo.

*DIY Paper Dragons
Going with the Maleficent idea, why not wrap paper dragons around green drinking straws. .

Disney Descendants Birthday Party Food & Drink Ideas

Being wicked sure works up an appetite, so let’s serve the partygoers some deliciously devious Descendants party foods to keep them going.

*Villainous Apples
Villainous apples made from marshmallows is the perfect treat to get guests taste buds excited.

*Jays Flying carpet pizza
For something with a bit more protein and a bit less sweet (sugary) you can make “Jay’s flying carpet pizzas”. Here’s a nice pizza recipe, and for the flying carpet look, before adding the toppings, cut the pizza dough into rectangles and pinch the corners – Abracadabra – flying carpet food.

*Carlos’s Doggy treats
Sticking with the Descendants main character theme, you can also make cookie treats – add cookie mix into a bone shaped baking tray (you can find them on Amazon) and when it’s done, cover in white icing sugar and voila doggie treats for Cruella’s son Carlos.

*Cruella’s Dogs
Since we’re on the Cruella topic, you can serve “Cruella’s dogs”, namely hot dogs or corn dogs – if you get creative with some black food colorant, you can even make them spotted, like Dalmatians.

*Ursula’s Tentacles
Back to the dentists’ nightmare, featured behind all doors are more desert treats like Ursula’s tentacles, or candy coated pretzel rods of evil – as the dentist would assure you.

*”Rotten to the core” caramel Apples or Poisoned Apple
You can even add “Rotten to the core” caramel apples – despite the label, they are delicious. To top it off, you can also make a poisoned candy apple with lime green and purple candy melts and for toppings add salted caramel, crushed candies and nuts.

*Mal’s Milkshake
Moving on to slightly healthier territory, here’s a simple tutorial for making Mal’s milkshake, and you guessed it, green and purple colors.

*Evil Queen Poison potion
As refreshment, you can design Evil Queen Poison Potion drinks (looks like this) –you just need some green bottles, apple shaped label and apple juice.

*Free Descendants Water Bottle Labels
Use these free printable Descendants water bottle labels to decorate an bottled drinks you’d like to provide as beverage at the party.

*More Descendants Party Food Ideas
Aside from that, Disney channel proves to be surprisingly helpful – they have their own host of Descendants party recipes – which you can download and print from here. It includes Evie’s apple dippers, Mal’s love spell cookies; Carlos’ Chocolate Yoghurt Pups and Jay’s seasoned fries.

*Free Printable Descendants Food Labels
After making your foods, use these free printable Descendants food labels to make tents featuring the names of each food on your party table.

Disney Descendants Birthday Cake Decorations & Ideas

Nestled on the throne sits not King Beast, but the King of Deserts – the birthday cake. The simplest and quickest option is to order a custom made cake from your local cake decorator – they can probably fondant anything (‘to fondant’ is definitely a verb there) including the Descendants characters. For something that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg, you can make the cake yourself, here are some Descendants birthday cake ideas and decorations:

*Maleficent Graffiti Cake
Here’s a very nice Maleficent graffiti cake – just like the “Long Live Evil” graffiti in the “Rotten to the core” song.

*Mal Doll Cake
For this cake you will not need quite as much fondant shaping skills, though you will need to be armed with patience but it’s definitely worth it. Using a Maleficent doll, you make a cake in the shape of the dress and decorate it just like in the tutorial below. Using the same skills you can also make an Evie doll cake.

*Descendants Cupcake Ideas
If cupcakes are more your thing, then you can make Cruella Deville cupcakes or Poison Apple cupcakes like this . You can also easily make some Maleficent cupcakes.  If you want to put more effort into your cupcakes here is a great tutorial showing you how to make descendants 2 cupcakes for the most important characters.

*Free Printable Descendants Cupcake Toppers and Wrappers
If all of the above sounds like too much hard work then use our Free Descendants 2 cupcake toppers and wrappers to decorate cupcakes instead.

Disney Descendants Birthday Party Games & Activities

Your troublemakers did not come all the way from the Isle of the Lost just to eat. No, they are here to cause some mischief – if you want to keep your kingdom safe, you need to keep them occupied. For younger children, Disney has a whole range of fun printables, from coloring cards to spot the difference and fill in the word games.

Since the undeclared purpose of Mal, Evie, Carlos and Jay revolves around a specific Magic Wand, you can easily incorporate it into a lot of games – and I do mean a lot of games.You can use it to give a spin to the classic pin the tail on the donkey and make your own “Pin the Magic Wand on the Fairy Godmother”.

*Steal the magic wand game
Going to the next stop for that particular train of thought, you can create your own “steal the wand game”. The aim of the game is to reach the wand while remaining undetected by the Fairy Godmother (whoever wins gets to replace her). The wand is placed right in front of the Fairy Godmother and the children are situated at the opposite end of the room. Whenever the Godmother has her head turned, the children can freely move – but when she looks directly at them, they have to freeze. Whoever moves when the “Godmother” looks is labeled as a thief and thrown back to Isle of the Lost (eliminated from the game). Whoever reaches the wand first wins.

*Lonnie’s Hip Hop Martial Arts
Another Descendants party game idea is to make a variation of the musical statues using the “rotten to the core” song. You can call it Lonnie’s hip hop martial arts – and have the children alternate between ‘ninja’ moves and hip-hop dancing moves.

*Descendants Makeovers
The movie also gives you a great opportunity to set up your own Evie and Mal makeup table – Evie and Mal do hair makeovers for the other characters in the movie. You can hire a make-up/body paint artist or try to do it yourself. Here is a small Evie makeup tutorial and also a Mal makeup tutorial. If you want to go the extra mile, you can give the children wigs, or even do their nails – who doesn’t want horned nails?

*Carlos’s Bag of Dalmations
There is also a variation of hide and seek that you can adapt to this game – namely “Carlos’ bag of Dalmatians”. One child is the Dalmatian and he must hide from the rest of the group while the other children count to 30-40 (or as long as their patience lasts). When they are done, they have to split off and search for the Dalmatian. Whoever finds the hiding child must join them in the hiding space and remain quiet. The space will pretty quickly fill up. The last child to find the ‘pups’ has to be the first to hide in the next round.

*Pass the wand
Back to the Magic Wand, children can play a pass on the wand game, where the wand is represented by a balloon. The children are to be split in two groups and whoever manages to ‘steal the wand’ first (pass it on to the other end) wins. They have to pass the balloon around without using their hands and if it bursts, they have to start over.

*Guess the Descendant game
Another idea for a game that is great at getting children talking to each other is the ‘name the character game’. Each child gets to be a character – from villains to citizens of Auradon. They get to have their name stuck on their forhead – can’t sneak a peek at it – and they have to ask the others questions about who they are (the answers are: yes, no, not applicable)

Disney Descendants Birthday Party Favors & Ideas

Once the party winds down and the children have to return to the Isle of the Lost, you can prepare some goodie bags for them, in remembrance of their time at Auradon Prep.

*DIY Descendants Favor Bag Idea
Print the Auradon Prep crest and put it on the bags. Alternatively, you can print any of the four main troublemakers and add them on the bags.

*Official Descendants party favors
As for what lines the inside of the pouch, you can give them Descendants tattoos and stickers, green and purple bracelets and miniature toy characters.

*Free Printable Descendants favor tags
Add these printable Descendants favor tags to the favors to match it to the theme too, this is great for any generic favors you might want to include like the green and purple bracelets we recommended above.

*Free Printable Descendants Favor Toppers
Also if you plan on providing some sweet treats, these free printable Descendants favor toppers will come in handy when combined with cellophane bags. 

*Descendants treats and candy Ideas
To fill up your candy favor bags, add some Maleficent cookies or a “Rotten to the core” apple gumball necklace.

Disney Descendants Birthday Outfits/Costumes

If you want to decorate more than the house, you can try your hands with some Descendants party outfits. The easy way is paved with Amazon and Disney Stores – they have full Evie, Mal and the gang costumes.

If, however, the DIY muses are nudging you, you can give it a shot at making your own costumes. For Evie, you need black combat boots, shredded leggings (here’s a tutorial), a graffiti skirt (spray paint will be your friend – write on it and make paint splatters) and dark blue jacket (with studs: tutorial ) .

For the Mal look, grab a purple shirt with green accents (spray paint tutorial), a pair of purple leggings (spray paint black stripes), a purple leather jacket with studs (see tutorial above), black boots and a purple wig.

If you want to share the joy, you can distribute wigs at the entrance, alongside a simple version of Maleficent’s horns. You can also accessorize the children with black fingerless leather gloves for ‘Evie’ and a red version for ‘Carlos’.

For the master craftsman, here is a more complicated DIY Maleficent headpiece. It takes effort, but the results are stunning. You can even make your own Maleficent staff – and rule over all mortals (or in this case, just one household).

Disney Descendants Birthday Gift Ideas

Last but not least, you need to consider what to get your own child. Fortunately the shops are teeming with Descendants based products – unfortunately you have to sift through all of the riff raff. Below you can find some Descendants birthday gift ideas that will save you hours of pointlessly scouring the internet. If your child loves dolls, then you are in luck – Disney released a whole line of Descendants dolls. There are even diary books (for Mal and Evie) and Descendant sketchbooks.

For something a bit more practical, you can find descendant backpacks – there are even leather versions of those (to make your child happier and have you deeply contemplate how exactly you’re going to clean it). There are even pricier items available, like a Descendants bike – although I would make sure it’s not a short lived phase before buying a bike with that theme.

Since there are a lot of makeovers going on in the movie you can get a Disney Descendants highlighter set – or a makeup kit. There are also “Rotten to the core” t-shirts and Auradon Prep pajama sets – thank God for commercialism (making parents’ lives easy).

“COD”, “blops”, “3arc”, “multi mods like DM, TDM”, “tryhard” and “hardscoping” – for a parent of 12+ year olds, this has probably become a usual occurrence in the household. Gamer language is hard enough without adding in-game specifics, but if your child is a hard core fan of “Call of Duty” then at least you have a nicely set birthday party theme. And a whole host of problems if you know nothing about the game – especially since gamers like to squabble over accurate knowledge and skills. You can either buck up and watch your kids at play, join in and be ‘pwnd’ (let’s face it, even with the age difference, they probably put in more game hours than you ever had) or put your “Google-fu” skills to the test, and praise the ever plentiful wikis. Although, there’s an even simpler solution to that, which is to find some “how to” guides for planning a Call of Duty birthday party. Below you’ll find a whole host of Call of Duty birthday party ideas with in-game language and tips that are bound to make the party memorable for your child (and make you seem less of a n00b).

Call of Duty Birthday Party Invitations and Ideas

All missions begin with a briefing – and the birthday party you are planning is no exception. A perfect way to get your troops to rally is to make your own Call of Duty party invitations. There are some templates available on the internet, like this one here. You’ll be done in no time.

If you want to wow your guests, you can add a bit more character to your invite: grab the COD skull emblem, set out a nice black background and add “Mission Brief: Join (name of child) in the secret co-op campaign at (name of place) homebase.”

If you really want to rock their socks off, and don’t mind a little bit of acting, instead of the standard paper invitation you can send a mission invite CD. You can film yourself with the call of duty logo behind, dressed in military garb and giving them on a ‘blops’ mission (Black Ops). For some extra flair, establish your neighborhood as a country that is at war and have your players come to recapture a borderland outpost (your home).

Another great Call of Duty party invitation idea is to send out dog tags. You can personalize them with the guest name and add the name of the company they belong to – or let them fill in the details themselves. Kids will love wearing these – and you can have fun setting out a military checkpoint where you ‘verify their credentials’.

You can make the package complete and in addition to the invite and tags, send out a painted origami gun. It’s easy to make, easy to paint and there will be no problem shipping it (unlike, say, a very non-flat toy gun).

Since we mentioned skulls a while back, if you have faith in your paper craft skills you can make a pop up skull card – it’s fun and unexpected.

Call of Duty Birthday Party Decorations and Ideas

With the invite on the way you need to prepare the ‘outpost’ for the upcoming ‘battle’ to reclaim it. A different battle of the same nature will take place once you need to reclaim your living space from the mess left behind after the party, but that’s another story.

The good thing about having to set up Call of Duty party decorations is that the game lends itself to a whole host of army style props. Our trek into military paraphernalia starts off with the good ole’ green camouflage netting. The netting is great for backdrops – or if you want to set up some laser tag course in your yard (you don’t want to bring paintballs into the mix, unless you feel like getting some exercise via vigorous scrubbing) . You can find the netting on Amazon, or, if the DIY master dormant inside of you is begging to be released, then you can make it yourself. Here is a tutorial on how to make the netting with a bonus on making wall panels. With these net covered panels you can even decorate your garden.

With the background all set it’s time to get wild with camo – there is plenty of it on the soldiers and vehicles from Call of Duty, and now there will be plenty of it in your home and around it. The nice thing about camo is that it can be applied to pretty much anything – including a Camo Balloon Arch. This is the look you’re aiming for. If you haven’t done this before, like most regular folk, then here is a simple tutorial to get you started. You just need to fill it with black and green balloons. As a bonus tip, if you add a bit of darker green spray paint on the lighter shade balloon before you inflate them, you will get nice patterns.

To complete the look, you can add plastic bullet bandoleers artistically draped over random objects. We also must not forget homemade grenades (using a round object like a baseball as a base and getting crafty with the paint. There is a tutorial on how to make the grenades in the ‘party table setup’ section below.

Since we’re in the weapons section, we might as well add balloon guns to the mix. There is a simple tutorial here, or, a more complicated one for those with nimble fingers over here. Alternatively, if you don’t want to spend time on this activity, you can always buy Call of Duty balloons from Amazon.

This is where old crates also come in handy – spread some around the house and stick some labels on them, like top secret, or, for more in-game references, Supply Drop.

The COD skull emblem is also perfect for decorating, alongside printed scope signs. And we mustn’t forget Nuketown posters . If that isn’t enough, you can always hang strips of green crepe paper streamers from the ceiling and attach plastic parachute men to them.

But ‘la Piece du Résistance’ is a checkpoint set up at the entrance to the yard. Have some intimidating friends or family members at the front where they stop all the guests to ask them for clearance, authorization, mission purpose and the like (some drill sergeant acting would be the icing on the cake). You can even have them distribute the ‘army makeup’. If you feel like making a fancy scenario, they can give the Special Ops soldiers a more in-detail mission briefing, along with a map on where the main objectives are (canteen aka food table or the outpost to be conquered, namely the backyard) .

Call of Duty Party table setup

Given that you expect a small army to drop by (pun very much intended), you need to have the mess hall or the canteen ready for them. Here is where you can let the camo muses run free – from camouflage table cloth to napkins and plates. In fact, there are even army camo food labels and cupcake wrappers ready for you to use. Don’t worry, though, as long as you stay clear of camo dresses, you’re safe from redneck territory.

Make sure to label the food table as the Canteen – its’ one of the available food courts in the game. You can scatter plastic army men around – you can have them conquer a ‘mountain’ of meat (with a nice flag on top). You can add Swiss army knives as decoration next to the tableware, and place some toy hand grenades on the table. If you’re feeling crafty, here is a tutorial on how to make your own grenade lookalikes based on squashballs and baseballs.

In a corner you can set up a crate (handy things, aren’t they?) with MRE bags (Meal Ready to Eat). Here are the printables for the MRE bags. You can fill them up with food or just have them as purely decorative items.

For the tableware, you can place it in a military helmet. Your plates can bear scope signs or the Call of Duty skull logo on them. Just print the logo and glue it on the underside of transparent plastic plates.

For another Call of Duty party setup idea, you can go with zombie style decorations (in COD: advanced warfare there is a game mode called ‘Exo Zombie’ – ‘nuff said). For this you need to have a white tablecloth (that you don’t need any more) on which you will then spray red paint, to make it look like blood splatter. A better way to achieve that is by flicking a brush dipped in red paint. To this you can add plastic insects and gummy worms here and there. Some plastic eyes and ears would also not be remiss. Since the zombies are a nice result of the “Experiments Gone Wrong” trope, you can print the Nuketown bio hazard sign and attach it to the bottom of transparent plates.  

Call of Duty Birthday outfits

You’ve decorated the house and the party table, all that’s left is to spruce up the attendees themselves.

You can get an easy Call of Duty character look by using standard soldier lookalike equipment. For a simple look give them some army helmets and make-up. If you’re going for the detailed approach, you can add plastic bullets bandoleers and a camo shirt (or complete uniform).

Going back to something less elaborate, there are a lot of Call of Duty t-shirts available online (with the zombie squad, the COD: Ghosts skull and so on). Speaking of that famous skull, you can make a Call of Duty skull mask yourself. Start off from a balaclava and use white fabric paint.

For a Zombie Mode party, here’s a very simple zombie costume.

Call of Duty Birthday Party Food and drinks

Since soldiers expend a lot of energy doing dangerous missions they need a lot of caloric intake – that means you have to be prepared with lots of food. Start your guests off with some delicious Burgertown burgers (it’s a chain restaurant from COD). Satisfying the beef enthusiasts, and the vegetarians, and the fish lovers is a tough job. Here is a nice mini-collection of recipes, to get you started.

To that, you can add some healthy food with these spicy cauliflower bites that will be labeled as “Napalm Zombies’ Fire Patch”. Going with the zombie Call of Duty theme, why not serve them some Zombie Monkey eyes ? (if you’re looking a bit pale, don’t worry, it’s just rice krispie made to look like eyes).

Back in zombieville – you can serve zombie hands popcorn – just fill transparent bags with green coated popcorn. And since we are lingering on this chapter, you can also play with Jell-O ‘Revival Shots’. Fill syringes with orange red Jell-O and your guests will be ready to be reanimated.

If you want to have a bit of fun, you can serve Crunch bars as Krust bars (Call of Duty creators sure like to poke fun at well known labels).

For the army look, have some camo chocolate coated apples ( yes, camo extends to this level – next stop is world domination). You can also serve a whole host of army vehicle shaped foods. Use cookie cutters in the shape of army tanks and fighter jets to make cookies or cut out sandwiches.

Another Call of Duty party food idea is to take some dark grey giant gumballs and with the aid of food colorant you can paint blue and red spots. Tada – now you have your own eatable Variable Grenades.

All that food requires some liquids to help it go down smooth. Call of Duty Zombie maps have Perk-a-Colas – so give your partygoers a perk, to help them survive: green soda is Speed Cola, light brown colored liquids are Juggernog, bright blue sodas become Quick Revive, purple sodas become PhD Flopper. Here are the rest of the sodas. For the labels, you can find them here and here. In the links below the post, you can find more Black Ops Perk-A-Cola labels.

Call of Duty Birthday cake and cupcakes

There is no birthday celebration without the guest of honor, namely, the birthday cake. For those on the hurry, it’s always possible to order a Call of Duty birthday cake at your local specialty cake bakery (although if you’re thinking of getting something resembling the items from Cake Boss you should be prepared to make your wallet cry, and possibly bleed a little).

You can also make your own cake at home. There is a simple general army version where you make the cake then cover it in fondant like in the tutorial here and add decoration (anything in the army style goes, from plastic bullet bandoleers and a plastic grenades).

If you want to invest a bit more effort, you can make the aforementioned cake toppers yourself, just follow the instructions in the tutorials and you’ll get fantastic eatable military gear. You can make grenade, bullets and dog tags out of fondant.

For the extra “Je ne sais quoi”, you can make a camo cake on which to place all your fondant decorations. In order to do that, use light green, dark green and brown fondant – and apply this marbling technique.

For a different Call of Duty birthday cake you can use the COD skull icon as a cake topper, on a cake covered in black fondant. Here is a skull model that you can print out and then cut out of white fondant.

While not exactly a Call of Duty gun cake (since there are no tutorials for lifelike gun cakes anywhere on the internet – after all, a fluffy replica that you can’t even hold up is very dangerous..) here is how you can do a Nerf Gun Cake . From there on you can probably adapt the model by changing the colors – Call of Duty makes it easy by adding Ray Guns to their arsenal, so your weapon design won’t look that out of place.

Call of Duty also features a whole lot of armored vehicles so a tank cake would not be remiss. Here is how you can make a very simple tank cake and here is the slightly more complicated version, for the nimble fingered craftsman.

Call of Duty features a lot of zombies – they are divided into types with different abilities and weaknesses. There is enough variety to make your brain hurt (wink wink, nudge nudge). The perfect cake for a Zombie Mode Call of Duty party is a zombie brain cake. Add some bullets from the tutorials above and you have a disgustingly delicious treat.

If cupcakes are your cup of tea, so to speak, then you can strike with the camo again and bake camouflage cupcakes or have regular cupcakes and add green frosting and a plastic soldier on top.

For the Zombie mode cupcake, make these sinfully delicious ’blood clot’ cupcakes.

Call of Duty Birthday Party Games and activities

Your games and activities are the primary mission objectives. Start off the attractions with a QET (quick time event) – a “super soaker hit the three zombie targets” trial that they have to finish before the time runs outs (tick tack, private, get a move on).

After the entrees is time to go for the main course – a joint mission. Set up a Call of Duty rescue mission by first dividing the children into teams. From each team, half of the members will become ‘the wounded’. The wounded have to stay at the opposite side of the yard from their teammates. You can mark the wounded area by tying/placing a red ribbon. Each team must treat their own members aka cover the wounded area in bandages. In order to win, a team has to treat all their wounded before the other teams do. In the spirit of fair play, you can play another round and give the victims a chance to play the rescuer.

Another ‘multiplayer event’ you can play is a trust exercise co-op campaign. You divide the children into teams of two and blindfold one of them. His or her partner must then guide the blindfolded person through a field of mines (balloons). The fastest pair to complete the track without popping a single balloon wins.

If you want to go for elaborate, you can arm your soldiers with soakers (or if you don’t mind spending extra, laser tag equipment) and organize a combination between two Call of Duty multiplayer games: Search and Destroy and King of the Hill. You’ll have to divide the children into two teams – the “destroyers” and the “protectors”. You can have them draw straws to see which team they fit in. As a general rule, establish what the ‘killshots’ are (soaker to the chest, laser to head etc.) and give them a timeframe to complete the mission. The Destroyer’s aim is to eliminate the defending team, or set off one of the two bombs on the side of the Protector’s fort before the time runs out. The Defenders’ aim is to hold the fort (not get everybody killed, or any bomb to explode) until the time runs out.

As a variant, you can also have them play Capture the Flag (it even features in Call of Duty). Obstacle courses also work well with this type of activity. To give it a more Call of Duty look, you can have tunnels made from cardboard refrigerator boxes and spray paint them green or have the children crawl under a net. If you don’t just happen to have such a net lying around the house, you can make your own by using some stakes set up in columns and attaching crisscrossing string to them. You can also rename the jumping through hoops part as the “Zombie Shuffle”.

Another fun Call of Duty party game idea is to organize your own Man Hunt. Split the children into two teams. Each team has to choose a Bait – a child that has to hide. The aim of the game is to find the other team’s Bait before they find yours. Here is a good place for them to show their great Black Ops tracking skills.

Lastly, you can also play “ Hot Grenade” – it’s just like hot potato where the children pass on a toy ‘Variable Grenade’ to a Call of Duty theme song. When the song stops, whoever has the grenade explodes out of the game. 

Call of Duty Birthday Party Favors

Once all the missions are successfully completed its’ time for the task force to retreat. As spoils of war, you can give them their own ‘Care Package’ boxes (the party favor boxes) made out of black take away containers with two orange ribbons with black striped.

In the box, the children can find Task Force stickers and tattoos, alongside COD skull key chains. There is a whole host of merchandise available for this game, from magnets, to hair bow and bracelets. You can add to the wonder with mini ray gun toys and zombies.

There are also Call of Duty: Ghosts flat bottle cap necklaces available at Amazon, and of course, let’s not forget dog tags, if you didn’t include them in the invite.

Call of Duty Birthday gift ideas

Last, but most definitely not least, we should not forget about the birthday boy or girl.

If you don’t mind spending a bit, there are Perk-A-Cola mini soda dispensing machines that you can buy. Or for customizing your game station, on Etsy you can find Xbox 360 bullet buttons. For wearable gifts, you can find Call of Duty: Ghosts shoes and even backpacks. Though, more than anything, your child will love you forever if you get them the new COD: Black Ops 3, as soon as it hits the stores.

In the meanwhile, you can also settle for Perk-A-Cola lunch bags, Nuketown tote bags and Urban Zombie Tactical Squad t-shirts – most of which can be found on Amazon, or by putting your “Google-fu” skills to the test.