Easy Luau Ideas For Kids

Who’s ready for a luau?! I love using a luau theme for summer parties. Whether it’s an end of the school year bash or neighborhood bbq, it’s a fun theme. Today I’m sharing easy luau ideas for kids.

There are luau crafts, snack ideas, games, decor and more. Enjoy and mahalo for reading! 

 What is a Luau?

A luau is a traditional Hawaiian party or feast that is often held to celebrate special occasions like birthdays, graduations, or weddings. It’s a fun and festive event that involves food, music, and dancing, and it’s a great way to bring people together. 

Choosing Your Luau Theme

You can do a traditional Hawaiian luau theme complete with lei’s and skirts or do a more specific theme, like this Moana luau party! 

3 Luau Handprint Crafts for Kids

These craft ideas are easy but fun!  

1. Pineapple Handprint

Supplies: yellow paper, white paper, green paint, brown crayon, glue & scissors

Directions: Cut an oval out of the yellow paper, make a green handprint on the white paper and cut it out. Glue it to the top of the yellow oval. Last, draw the brown lines on the pineapple. 

2. Hula Handprint (click here for directions)

3. Flamingo Handprint (click here for directions)

Easy Luau Activities for Kids 

These themed activities will make your luau party something the kids will be talking about all year round!

1. Paint Shells

You can collect shells if you are at the beach but we were not to to make things easy, I ordered this box of shells from Oriental Trading and they were perfect for painting

2. Do the limbo!

This is such an easy game to play!  All you need is a broom or long stick and two people to hold each end! 

3. Water Balloon Hot Potato

Water balloons plus this fun gadget I found on Amazon makes for a fun game!

4. Hawaiian Flower Photo Opp

This was so easy and made for some really cute photos. We used an old picture frame (11X14) and spray painted it blue. Then I got a bag of Hawaiian flowers from Oriental Trading and glued them all around. 

Luau Snacks for Kids 

These snacks are  perfect for your luau! They are easy to make and kids are sure to love them!

1. Beach Bucket Popcorn

SO easy and looks adorable for any summer party. The mini buckets and shovels are from Oriental Trading. 

2. Fun Fruit Skewers

This was easy – just cut up fruit and I added the pieces onto these cute pineapple stem toothpicks. They looked festive and were the perfect size for a few pieces of fruit 

3. Beach Sand Pudding Cups

All you need is  vanilla pudding, topped with smashed graham crackers (sand!). Then I added Hawaiian umbrellas from Oriental Trading. 

4. DIY Pineapple Snack Cups

This was a fun little DIY. I got these solid yellow cups and drew the pineapple design with a Sharpie. Then I cut leaves out of green paper. It took just a few minutes and made great snack cups for the luau.

You can also check out these adorable luau drinks!

Luau Party Supplies

All of the party supplies below are from Oriental Trading. They have the cutest luau items and at a great price.  It’s definitely one of my top tips for creating an easy luau for kids!

 I’ve gone to doing table cloth rolls for parties because you can use for different size tables and easily save what you don’t use.

The pack of flamingo and parrot glasses from Oriental Trading are awesome and something cute for kids to take home!

For the Hawaiian leis, one fun idea is to get them in your kids school colors if it’s a school end of the year party.

Two years in a row I got solid yellow and solid blue leis (our school colors) and it looked like a luau meets school spirit! Oriental Trading has a lot of different solid colored leis.

 

1. Hawaiian Leis

2. Cups, plates, napkins

3. Tropical Leaf Table covers (all of the table clothes in the photos)

4. Pineapple drink holders 

5. Hawaiian party favors 

 

Easy Luau Party Decor 

These easy luau ideas for kids wouldn’t be complete without some fun decor to go along with it!

1. Pineapple Center Piece

 Just put sunglasses on a real pineapple… what’s easier than that 🙂

2. Flamingo lawn decorations 

Because what luau is complete without flamingo lawn decorations?! 

3. Pineapple Plant Balloon Wall

I ordered large and small leaves from Oriental Trading and then added yellow balloons. You can stack the leaves/balloons for an even cooler look! 

 

Easy Luau Party Favors

Want to send the kids home with a fun and festive party favor?  Some easy ideas you can use are:  mini beach balls, sunglasses, and flower hair clips!

 

An update! Looking for easy ideas to host a virtual luau for kids?

Just because we can’t gather in groups, doesn’t mean we can have fun themed parties! 

Last week we hosted a virtual luau for Alex’s class “end of the year” party and it was a lot of fun.  It was also a super easy luau that the kids loved!

How we prepped: I put together a bag of luau supplies for each kid in a large ziplock and left on my front porch for the parents to pick up. 

What was in the party bag: 

I got all of these supplies from Oriental Trading. They came in one big box and I could easily “safely” make their zip lock of supplies while wearing gloves. 

• Sunglasses and a Hawaiian lei to wear during the virtual party. It was so cute to see them all matching on the call!
• Color your own luau bookmarks 
• Bingo boards. I picked these because they came with a mini dry erase marker to mark off squares
• Surfboard keychains (to be their Bingo prize)
• Luau cup – so they could all have the same cup to enjoy some water/juice during the party

The virtual luau party details:

We hosted the party on Zoom. Kids brought their own snacks and drinks. We played Bingo and when kids won, they could hold up the prize that we had put in the bag (so many cute luau prizes on Oriental Trading!).

We also played charades. I sent out a list of ideas ahead of the party. We used the chat feature to let kids guess which was a lot of fun! Kids can also work on their craft (see above) during the Zoom and chat about summer. 

Have a great luau! 

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