Ice Age Party | Ultimate games, activities and decorations!
Hello welcome to my site where I share the best birthday party ideas including games, activities and awesome decorations! This post is all about throwing an Epic Ice Age party.
I had so much fun writing this, Ice Age was probably my favourite children’s movie and I hope my fandom comes through in all these ideas!
I’m Zoe, a professional kids’ party host, now the creator of this blog where I hope to share all of the best advice from years of testing and improvement. I hope to make this party planning process as simple as possible for you so that you can be present with your child and really enjoy this celebration of their milestone.
At the end of this post, I have a free party planning checklist and a list of delegatable tasks designed to help with this!
Ice Age theme party games
1. Day in the life of an ice age
This is a fun, active game for the kids! The facilitator calls instructions and kids have to do the assigned actions listed below. Each time a kid does the wrong action, or if they’re too slow. they can be sent out! Alternatively, for younger kids, you can reward the best ‘action-acting’ or reward the fastest response!
- Make a fire- Kids crouch on the floor and pretend to try and run flint stones together
- It’s freezing cold! – kids wrap their arms around themselves and pretend to shiver
- On the lookout – Kids pretend to look through binoculars- searching for any dangerous animals
- Cave art – Kids run to one side of the room and pretend to draw on the walls
- To the workshops – kids run to the other side of the room and pretend to sharpen sticks as their hunting tools
This can be a great, high-energy game and a nice way to burn some extra energy if needed! To simplify is for younger kids, use only the first 3 action calls.
2. Frozen animals!
This game is like music statues, but with an ice age theme. In the story, the animals are travelling north in a big herd. Kids have to travel/ dance around the room in a circle and when the music stops the facilitator can call out ‘ice age!’ and the kids have to freeze.
You can play so that the slowest freezer is out, or so that kids are sent out if they do any wobbling, or just rewards the best statue of the funniest frozen animal.
One of the best things about the Ice Age Movies is the epic soundtrack- so definitely use theme music here for this game!
3. Mammoth, Mammoth, Tiger
This game is like duck duck goose only rather than ducks and geese, it’s mammoths and tigers!
This is a really nice game to play either when kids arrive to get them immediately stuck in, or when they filter off from snack time at different rates. Since the game will be familiar to many (and is easy to pick up otherwise)
4. Dinosaur footsteps
This game takes a bit of narrative set-up! It is based on the 3rd movie- Dawn of the Dinosaurs. As the ice melts, the group travel to a new place and finds dinosaur land!!! AAAAAghghhhh!
Kids line up along one side of the room and at the other side, one kid is the designated dinosaur. (The game is like Grandmother’s Footsteps). This dinosaur faces the wall, away from the other kids.
While the dinosaur is turned away, the adventurers tiptoe forward and as soon as the dinosaur turns around they have to freeze. If the dinosaur catches anyone moving, they can be sent out or back to the start line. The child who manages to tap the shoulder of the dragon wins!
Have you also seen our Shrek party ideas, or our Toy Story party ideas post?!
Ice Age theme birthday party activities
1. Faux – Sledge racing!
There are a few indoor versions of this game you could play. Kids will have great fun getting into teams and pulling each other around!
Grab some medium-sized tarpaulins and rope and get the kids to work in groups to design ‘sledges to race against each other. One or two children will pull the sledge and the others will sit inside!
This works best if you have a large corridor or space to race the sledges. It will work on different floor surfaces but might need adapting depending on your set-up. This is a really nice blog article about a sledge design stem activity for slightly older kids, but with ideas that you can simplify for any age!
2. Snowcone Ice making (or blue slushies)
This is common to American audiences, but not so common outside of the states. It’s basically crushed ice that you can pour flavoured syrups over, for a snack that’s a little like ice cream and slushy combined.
You can either buy preprepared sets (syrups, Ice shavers) or make your own version- we found this great blog post outlining DIY ideas of how to do that.
This is a really fun ice age theme food-making activity, and you can jazz it up even more with hundreds and thousands on top!
3. Treasure hunt for acorns
Remember Scat, the caber-toothed squirrel who loves his Acron from the movie?! In his honour, we suggest an accord search around the party room!
You can hide 8 acorns (or acon cards) and let the children search for them in exchange for a prize if they can find all 8! Treasure hunts are simple instant winners at a party.
4. Ice Age dance party!
I’m talking silver disco ball, blue disco lighting, balloons all around, and the best of the ice age soundtrack for a dance party. This is always fun. Make it ice-age-themed with bits of costume that the kids can share around between each disco song!
For instance, you can buy some blue glitter fabric and cut it into smaller scarves/headbands and hair ties for the disco!
5. Play some favourite Ice Age clips!
Rather than watching the whole movie, you could always show one or two of the funniest clips! There are some compilation videos on YouTube- like this one below, that have already selected their ‘best moments’.
This example is from the first film, but you’ll be able to search for whichever your child loves best!
This could be a fun thing to put on while children have their snacks!
6. Pin the tail on the sloth!
Print out any picture of Sid with his tail showing and make two copies. Cut out the tail from one of them and stick some blue-tac on the other side. (As I wrote this my husband pointed out that there is a scene where Manny is teased with a suggestion: let’s play pin the tail on the mammoth! that would work to!)
Kids, blindfolded have to tac the tail onto the post in the place they think it would be …they take off their blindfold and the next person tries! Closest wins!
7. Freezing Ice-land photobooth
You can get some ice-age theme probs and run a photo booth. I found a specialised ice age background, or you can get a more general ice themed one and have kids dress up in hats scarves and gloves like they’re on a trip to the North Pole!
This will be precious and such a cute way to capture pictures of your child and all their friends!
Ice age party decoration ideas
We love to transform the feel of a space to suit a theme in the boldest, most cost-effective way possible! Here are our top 5 suggestions for Ice Age birthday party decorations:
- Blue and silver foil curtains. This will instantly transform the feel of a space and it’s a perfect way to cover up and mess or non-theme related vibes. You can even hang these over the entryway so they’re an interactive welcome to the Ice Age atmosphere.
- Blue and white balloons in big bunches. Balloons are my favourite way to make a space look and feel festive! They can also be very inexpensive and nowadays it’s also easy to find eco-friendly balloons!
- Huge wintery backdrop. We’ve suggested this already for the photoshoot activity but having a huge icy backdrop will totally help create the atmosphere for the party as well as for photoshoots! I found a specialised ice age background, or you can get a more general ice-themed one for not too expensive if it’s within your budget.
- Ice Age character cake/food toppers. The real essence of the Ice Age movie is the brilliant characters. now that we’ve made the space feel ice wintery and magical, adding character cake toppers will be a lovely addition to the decorations. I have found these quite difficult to find online so my best suggestion is buying Ice Age Stickers, cutting round circles of black card and sticking these stickers on as food toppers.
- Music! To transform the atmosphere of a space music is the most evocative thing, especially for littlies! The movies have brilliant soundtracks so be sure to have them playing whenever there is a good moment. For background music in downtime, play some ‘fairy music‘ for the mystical, prehistoric vibes.#
Good luck!
We hope you have loved some of the ideas on this site, and feel pumped to host this epic Ice Age birthday party!
To help you even more, we have created a step-by-step guide with a timeline for kid’s party planning which includes this PDF party planning checklist, and a PDF list of tasks you can be delegating. These are ALL FREE, no email is required either, simply download.
Above all, make sure you are present for your child and that they are having fun! Birthdays are special times, and parties are a lovely way to gather with friends. They are joyous, and not stressful, so only arrange what feels fun for you- your kids will have fun if you have fun!
Best of luck,
Zoe xx
