For my son's 9th birthday, we had an Indiana Jones Adventure.  I sent plain tan invitations stating that the guest would help the birthday boy find a lost golden idol. There were only seven boys, including the birthday boy. We kept it small because it took some time for the activities. We had the party in the evening because of the maze we created in the backyard.  It was much more fun in the dark than during the day. Activities:  First, the boys dug for treasure. Earlier in the week, I had taken seven gold, one dollar coins and rolled them in plaster of paris and sand,(easy on the sand). I sprinkled sand on the finished ball so it would look like a rock.  Plaster of paris is easy to use, it's just messy. Everything except opening presents, took place outside. The boys had to chip away at the rocks until they found the coin. They used plastic knives and other rocks as their tools. Then, they mummified barbies.  I collected seven old, clothed barbies from friends and the boys used plaster cloth (it's used for model railroads and comes in a roll of perforated strips) dipped in water to wrap the barbies. They were almost dry by the end of the party. You may want to practice this first, so you know how many strips it will take to cover the doll. One boy used a lot of strips and I had to give it to him the next day because it was too wet. You can find plaster cloth at train stores or large craft supply stores.  They really enjoyed this activity and the finished mummies looked quite real. The last activity was the adventure maze.  One boy at a time went through. He was equipped with only a flashlight.  The movie's theme song played as each boy had to work his way through a box maze with snakes and rats scattered about.  Their goal was to find the golden idol hidden somewhere in the maze. Because it was dark, it took each kid a while to find it.  Before the entered the box maze, they had other obstacles to overcome - swinging over a blow-up baby pool filled with water, and a giant beach ball, spray painted to look like the massive rock that rolled after Indiana in the first movie. The box maze took a lot of work and time, the day of the party, to put together.  I got the boxes from Lowes and Target.  You need to call ahead to have them save the boxes for you. Cake - the cake was the rock - I took a soccer ball shaped pan and just put grey icing all over it. I place LEGO Indiana Jones toys in front of it.  Really simple. Favors - the favors were the gold coin and mummy and a large bag of M&M's that had Indiana Jones on it. My son said this birthday was the best one yet.