For my son's 5th birthday party he requested his first night-time party and wanted it to be outdoors. We live on a big property with lots of trees but being winter we had to had an indoor back up plan in case of rain (fortunately did not need)   The invitations were hand delivered as we saw all the kids during the fortnight before the party. I bought glow in the dark paint from ebay and wrote the invitations on black card - a bit tricky to do but worked well. "You are invited to "D's" Night Time Party....." and all the details etc We invited 12 children aged from 2 to 10 years and there were 28 adults as well.(quite a crowd!) They began to arrive about an hour and a half before it got dark. As they arrived the children were encouraged to help me create paper bag lanterns - strong brown paper bags with sand placed in them , and then a tealight pushed into the sand. There was pencils, crayons etc available for decorating. This worked well and some lovely creations were made. I also allowed my son to open his presents in this quiet beginning time - before the frenzy of the party really began.  I had juice and dips and crackers and salsa laid out on the table for snacking on.  Once all the children were here we moved the party outside .My husband had specially built a flying fox (cable ride) between two trees - the run was about ten metres long, but only about a metre above the ground. This was a huge hit and the children were quite happy to take turns riding. We also handed out cardboard boxes for sliding down our small hill, hung ropes off trees to swing on, and a rope walk between two trees. After they'd happily played on this equipment for an hour my husband and his adult helpers got a huge bonfire going (we'd gathered wood etc for weeks before!)and fired up the BBQ.  As the sun was going down we all sat around the fire using log rounds for seats (and camp chairs)and ate hotdogs, vegie burgers and kebabs (vegies, and pieces of sausage skewered and bbq'd) This was great - no washing up and no plates)  it is freezing where we live after dark but I had told everyone to bring a blanket and so after eating children and parents cuddled up around the fire to listen to stories.  I had hired an amazing storyteller who sang songs, played guitar and told tales, including a wonderful traditional tale from Africa accompanied by a hand drum.  The children were mesmerised. While they were listening I snuck away and laid out all the lanterns just away from the storytelling area(and some more I had made earlier) and lit them. When the stories had ended and they all looked up they were delighted to see this twinkling display that had appeared like magic. We then lit sparklers and blew bubbles and shined torches on them (that idea was from this site - looks great)  By this time everyone was getting pretty cold so we all trooped inside for hot chocolate, coffee and tea and birthday cake.  the birthday cake was lots of individually decorated cup cakes placed close together to form one cake. They were decorated deep blue with little candy stars to look like the night sky (thanks Grandma!)This was easy to serve (once again no washing up!)  Then it was home time(and bedtime for little ones) - I had found enamel camping mugs at a discount store on which I wrote their name in glow in the dark paint and in them I placed two hot chocolate sachets, a little bag of marshmallows, a glow stick and tied a bag of home made gingerbread cookies in the shape of stars to the handle. It was a very inexpensive party, with minimum cleanup and maximum impact. The grownups loved it as much as the kids and the birthday boy was over the moon (and under the stars!)