For my son's 7th birthday, I made a chess party. The theme was tricky because while he knows how to play, most of his friends do not. So I made up party games with the theme that did not require anyone to play chess. I made hats for each child from newspaper sheets. Each child was given a hat and each hat was decorated to be a black or a white chess piece. To encourage the children to keep the hats on, my son suggested each child would get a prize if they kept the hats on. (it was a lollypop) My son was a white king and his favorite friend was the black king. There were also knights, castles and bishops. The parents were offered hats so they could be the pawns. (haha) I painted a life size chess board and laid it on the living room floor. Tiny numbers were on some of the squares. We played a game with music much like music chairs. I called it musical squares. If the music stopped and you landed on a square that had the number that was called, you were out. I had those children help me pick the numbers. We also played pin the knight on the board, which required the children to place a paper knight on a paper chess board (which i made) in the correct place. We also had a three-legged race and a scavenger hunt, with clues that I wrote that had chess-themes to them. The photos were great because they were taken from a floor above and show human chess pieces on a big board. The kids did keep their hats on and they looked great. This party is not one anyone ever has, so I improvised on paper goods, using the checkerboard napkins from a NASCAR themed paper set. I also found a plastic checkerboard tablecloth and silver paper plates. I took a HULK pinata (which I bought for $1 from the dollar store) painted black over him and put white squares on the body for a chess pinata. We had cupcakes that were chocolate and white and each had a chocolate chess piece. I made the chocolate pieces with a mold I bought on Ebay. I could have made the cupcakes square, but the square cupcake pan cost $35 and I figured it really didn't matter enough. Goody bags included miniature chess sets for all the children, except a few who were toddlers who got checkers. It was a great party for a little chessmaster!