HOA National Night Out, Christmas Party and Carnival Ideas

[ekatiel]

Somehow, I've ended up the chair of our HOA's social committee-- It's been pretty inactive for the past few years, so we'd like to get some events planned for this year. I have my first meeting tonight (there are 5 or 6 of us attending). I'm typing up ideas for three different events and wondered if any of you had input on things your HOAs have done for various events. We'd like to do three events this year:

National Night Out (which is in October in Texas)
A Winter/Christmas Party
A Carnival (either in the spring or on the Saturday after the last day of school)

We have a community park where the events would be hosted. It has a large grassy area, a playground and a gazebo. Any ideas for these three events? I'm especially stumped for National Night Out-- not sure what to do for this one. --Katie

 

[DisneyCowgirl]

Somehow, I've ended up the chair of our HOA's social committee-- It's been pretty inactive for the past few years, so we'd like to get some events planned for this year. I have my first meeting tonight (there are 5 or 6 of us attending). I'm typing up ideas for three different events and wondered if any of you had input on things your HOAs have done for various events. We'd like to do three events this year:

National Night Out (which is in October in Texas)
A Winter/Christmas Party
A Carnival (either in the spring or on the Saturday after the last day of school)

We have a community park where the events would be hosted. It has a large grassy area, a playground and a gazebo. Any ideas for these three events? I'm especially stumped for National Night Out-- not sure what to do for this one. --Katie

What's your budget?

National Night Out in my neighborhood is done on a smaller scale--blocks as opposed to the whole neighborhood--but we usually do something grilled. Each household brings sides or desserts to share, plus their own drinks. For what you describe, assuming you have the budget for it, I would do something grilled (burgers, hotdogs) for all, but have each family brings their own sides and drinks.

We have a catered event (not fancy catering, but good) at Christmas, and we charge a small amount for it to make up the budget (around $5) and it gets a good turnout. Santa is available for visits and pictures.

For the carnival, my only suggestion is a warning to make sure to have separate events for various ages--you don't want the 12 year-olds in the bounce house with the 3 year-olds.

 

[ekatiel]

Thanks for the ideas. Not sure I should say the exact budget on a public message board (I think it's probably OK to say, but I'm new to this whole thing and don't want to step on any neighborhood toes ). We should have enough for several bouncy-type things or other rentals at each event, maybe even enough for blown snow at the Christmas event, although that would be pushing the budget-- I hope that gives you more of an idea!

 

[chris31997]

National Night Out/Carnival: I would do potluck type thing, maybe a like chili cook off. You can have catagories for best dessert, side dish, or whatever and see if you can pull some baskets together for gifts.

Christmas/Holiday:catering would be nice, could price it per family. If you do Santa and he gives gifts you might want to tell the parents to provide a $5 prewrapped gift for child or you give candy canes or ornament

2 bounce houses, one for toddlers and one for older kids. You can get cheap crafts from Oriental trading. You could even look into a water dunk tank. For the carnival see if the families want to contribute to the games and come up with some games, maybe have 10-20 families make/create the games and you provide little prizes. Games could be like a putting green, tossing ping pong balls into buckets, fishing type games, think fall festival games

 

[zoemurr]

2x at our house.. PM me if you would like more details

We hung up a clothesline in the shape of an L
We hung very cheap straw mats from them so each game had a back drop
We made all the games:

Frog catapult
Ping Pong Splash (use water spray bottles to spray ping pong balls of the top of beer bottles)
Tic Tac Toe (divided the inside of a box into 9 squares and used wiffle type balls) spraypainted/decorated
penny pitch (collected tons of glass containers at garage sales)
ball toss (set up lots of plastic cups filled w/water in the kiddie pool and they had to toss balls in)
Plinko
balloon darts
mini golf (had a small putting green)
ladder golf (made from PVC pipe)
knock over the animal (screwed hinges into a plank of wood and wired stuffed animals onto it so they would knock over when hit with a ball.)

We had sand art necklaces, popcorn and cotton candy. Kids didn't buy tickets, but they won them at the games. Could turn them in for prizes or snacks. We also had a bounce house, but honestly they mostly did the games.

Have fun!

 

[EcbLovesMickey]

I have always wanted to host an egg hunt for our HOA. It is easy and relatively inexpensive. Plus I am hoping to do a Halloween-ie roast before the kids trick or treat this year

 

[snoopy5386]

National Night Out here was an ice cream social

 

[LynnTH]

I have been on our NNO Committee for the past 6 years. Our church sponsors this event for our community and it is always held the 1st Tuesday of August (which it is all over the U.S.).

We try to come up with different ideas every year. Some things are the same. Everything is free to the community so either the church pays for it or we get donations. We have a stand set up with hot dogs, chips, pop/water. A local neighborhood watch group comes in and serves root beer floats.

We have games for the kids. (Fish pond, Candy Walk or Cereal Walk- which is like a cake walk but eithe with candy or cereal/snacks, duck pond etc.) We hire a facepainter and we have some gals that do the colored hair spray for the kids (and adults). We also have door prizes that we either draw names for or they spin a wheel to win.

We usually get a inflatible or two and have some sort of entertainment. This year we have this guy who travels all over and does stunts on his bike while also teaching kids about different safety topics. So, we booked him for 2 shows. We also have a company coming out and setting up laser tag for the kids. Also getting a dunk tank this year.

In the past we have had The Teddy Bear Band, Science Museum, Cops with their K9 dogs, DARE, Science Guys, Zoomobile, Jugglers etc. It is a challenge to come up with new ideas but still have things that promote community and safety.

The fireman and police also show up as well as they mayor. We ususally have about 800-1000 people in attendance. We also put up a sign saying we are collecting for our local food shelf and most people will bring items for that - so, we have a booth set up for that.

 

[ekatiel]

I have been on our NNO Committee for the past 6 years. Our church sponsors this event for our community and it is always held the 1st Tuesday of August (which it is all over the U.S.).

We try to come up with different ideas every year. Some things are the same. Everything is free to the community so either the church pays for it or we get donations. We have a stand set up with hot dogs, chips, pop/water. A local neighborhood watch group comes in and serves root beer floats.

We have games for the kids. (Fish pond, Candy Walk or Cereal Walk- which is like a cake walk but eithe with candy or cereal/snacks, duck pond etc.) We hire a facepainter and we have some gals that do the colored hair spray for the kids (and adults). We also have door prizes that we either draw names for or they spin a wheel to win.

We usually get a inflatible or two and have some sort of entertainment. This year we have this guy who travels all over and does stunts on his bike while also teaching kids about different safety topics. So, we booked him for 2 shows. We also have a company coming out and setting up laser tag for the kids. Also getting a dunk tank this year.

In the past we have had The Teddy Bear Band, Science Museum, Cops with their K9 dogs, DARE, Science Guys, Zoomobile, Jugglers etc. It is a challenge to come up with new ideas but still have things that promote community and safety.

The fireman and police also show up as well as they mayor. We ususally have about 800-1000 people in attendance. We also put up a sign saying we are collecting for our local food shelf and most people will bring items for that - so, we have a booth set up for that.

Thanks for the ideas. NNO is the first Tuesday in August everywhere except Texas. I know it's crazy, but that's the hottest time of the year here, so I guess Texans decided to have their own date a few years ago. We even have our own banners on the NNO website . I think we decided to go low-budget, grass roots for NNO this year. We're recruiting one person from each section of the neighborhood (we have nearly 800 homes in 13 sections) to head up NNO for his section. They can just have a get together on the front lawn or do a pot luck. We're going to spend most of our budget money on the other two events. I'm very excited-- I think we have enough $$ for snow at the Christmas event-- that must sound super strange to you guys from up north, but down here, people pay to have snow blown for parties so the kids can play in it!! It will be a big draw . Thanks for the ideas, and keep them coming! --Katie