For my son's 4th birthday we had a pirate party. We have lots of friends with kids and he goes to a very large private school so we invited them all. We had over 28 kids at the party.  For invitations I crumpled paper up and tea stained it several times to give it a aged effect.  I printed the information of the front in traditional pirate talk (where we changed all the's to zee and use shiver me timbers, ahoy matey, walk zee plank, and arr).  I then printed a map to our neighborhood complete with X marks the spot.  We actually had the party at the playground across the street.  I did the invitations four to a page and cut them out with special scissors for the effect.  Weeks ahead of time I ordered a giant pirate ship that was a bounce house, slide and rock climbing wall.  The decorations included brown streamers around the pavilion to make it look like the rails of a boat. The mast wheel was purchased at a store.   The plates, cups, table cloths and napkins were all black to make it less expensive. We also had fake palm trees we already had in the house just for fun.  I also hung black and white streamers and big blow up parrots to make it more festive.  Being my son's birthday is in May there were a lot of Luau things at the store on sale that made the biggest impression.  We also placed bamboo torches in a few areas, which we did not light.  My so dressed as a pirate and so did some of the parents including me. As soon as the children arrived they had to talk pirate talk to get their pirate outfit.  There is this store in my area called US toys and most everything came from there and is super cheap, it is also on the internet.  I gave them each a pirate had, eye patch and red sash (made by cutting red cloth into strips, very cheap).  On some of the kids we painted mustaches and goatees with face paint. I also had my sister take a digital picture of each child, which we ran up to the store during the party and had them all printed out. To keep them busy while we were still getting everything ready they made a hook, by using black cups with a hole in the bottom and silver pipe cleaners.  We also had a balloon artist on hand to make pirate swords, monkeys, parrots and fish for the kids. After that they all played on the pirate ship and playground while all the parents had a good time visiting. Because we had so many children at such young ages we had pretty much a free for all with just a few organized activities. After a while we called them all in for lunch, which was pirate ship hot dogs, gold chip tortillas and hamburgers. We served drinks, as well which the best hit was the pirate root beer.  They played again on the pirate ship and to get them all in again we ate cake, which was just a sheet cake decorated like a treasure chest. Just to keep them around we told them about the pirate treasure. While they were all busy eating cake I recruited some of the parents to hide the pirate treasure around the playground, kind of like an Easter egg hunt.  This included beaded necklaces, big gaudy rings, plastic bracelets, a few ring pops and play coins.   This was better than a pinata because of so many kids.  We did not open present at the party because it was a little overwhelming the year before, another large party. When the kids were leaving, which was hard to get them out of the pirate ship, they had to walk the plank. We just put a plank of wood of the pavilion and at the end was a basked with all the goodie bags. I took black lunch bags that had scull and cross bones pencils, pirate tattoos, telescopes, a bag of chocolate gold coins, more eye patches and a thank you card saying thank you for coming to my party.  I had a teenage friend hand them their pirate picture at the end.  Every one had such a good time and now I have every parent asking me to do their child's party.   Because I own my own decorative design business, we do a lot of kids rooms, I have some spare time in which we are starting a high end children's party planning business. You just have to think like a kid