shadow..... i dont know if i am too late or not to help you but we had a luau themed carinval today and i am the co-chair of it so if you still need help email me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and i will see what i can do to give you some ideas. one thing we did though is the limbo, but we did it cake walk style... (still had a cake walk too) but the limbo was geared for the kids, and they won a cupcake, or brownie(in bag) or cookies, or twinkie. we even made our own limbo set too. also we got decorations at orientaltrading.com and they have glitter luau tattoos. that were great to stay with the theme. also bought a 100 pk of leis for $15 from them and sold them for 50 cents each. need any more ideas feel free to email me. i have tons of ideas.
One of our most popular games is a sponge toss and with our Hawaiian theme we called it Surfing. We paint the game to match our theme each year.
You have a large piece of plywood with a hole cut in the middle big enough to fit your head through comfortably. Then we built legs to make it stand kind of like an easel. One person sticks their head through the hole(think teachers, principal or even the kids)and you have a "thrower" who gets to toss three soaking wet(small) sponges at the person. If they hit with all three they get a prize. We have the target wear safety goggles to protect their eyes and you need to establish a line the thrower must stand behind to keep someone from getting to carried away and hitting the person too hard.
You will need an area where it won't matter if the floor gets wet. We set our game in a pool. Keep a mop handy to sop up the water off the floor every once in awhile.
When I planned my daughter's end of the year 5th grade party we had a poi eating contest which was just vanilla pudding. If I remember correctly we used 1/3 cup of pudding (you can adjust amount)...no hands allowed to hold the bowl or plate in place. Oh and we purchased a big can of pudding at Sam's Club. I had my husband sand a couple of coconuts. We played pass the coconut but it was done by using their necks (tuck the coconut under their chin) and pass to the next person. With the same coconuts you can play hot potato. Just be careful, I was surprised at how easy it was for the coconuts to break! We also did limbo to luau music. Another idea is a Hawaiian pinata (tiki shaped).
we did a Luau Spring Fling one year. We did all the normal carnival type games only gave them hawaiian names. Oh, hula lessons were a big hit! We had a bunch of hula skirts and played music from Lilo & Stitch. I LOVE the luau theme. You can also go to alohafriends.com and find ideas and also you can find your name on a list and it will tell you your hawaiian name. We sold visors and they chose whether they wanted their american name or hawaiian name.
