It’s that time of year again to plan some spooky & fun Halloween activities for kids to do at home. The Halloween season is such a fun time of year for the whole family. It’s all about make-believe, costumes, and enjoying family & friends. Plus there are Halloween parties, cool Halloween decorations, pumpkin carving, and more to help you get into the Halloween spirit.
Let’s get you ready with fun Halloween ideas for kids of all ages to do at home and in your community. Use our list of favorite things to do at Halloween to help you plan an awesome October with your kids.
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Best Halloween Activities for Kids & Families at Home
Halloween is a great time of year to spend time with the kids. What I love about this holiday is there are no presents it’s just about enjoying all things Halloween & fall-related.
A great way to keep the Halloween excitement going all month is to try fun Halloween activites at home. But don’t worry our list only has easy Halloween activites to try because let’s be honest we are all so busy.
Look through the kid’s activities list and pick out a few to try this year. Who knows they may even become your new Halloween Tradition.
You can also use our Free Printable Fall Bucket List to help you plan your Halloween activities.
If you want to stay more socially distanced this year check out How to Have a Fun Socially Distanced Halloween with Your Kids.
Favorite Halloween Games
The entire family can have a blast playing fun Halloween games together. These are also great games for a fun Halloween party at home or at Halloween school parties.
Halloween Mystery Boxes
Create DIY Halloween Mystery boxes out of an old shoe box. They’re a play on a sensory box filled with spooky Halloween items. Kids will reach inside and try to figure out if it’s Zoombie Brains or spaghetti without looking inside the box.
My kids love trying these every year at home and I’ve used them at my kids school party too. It’s a simple way to add sensory play to a Halloween party.
Learn how to make a DIY Halloween Mystery Box
Printable Halloween Games
Play all Halloween season with these super fun Printable halloween Games. This fun halloween bundle has 18 different Halloween-themed games to play from Halloween Trivia to Scavenger Hunts, Roll & Color Skeleton, Word Scrambles, Mad Libs and more.
The ready-to-go printable has everything you need to play. Just download, print, and play!
Game of Halloween Charades
This is a great family game night idea. Split up into two groups and try to guess what Halloween word your teammate is trying to act out.
Use our free printable Halloween Charades word list to make this an easy game for home or parties.
Halloween Bingo
Play a fun game of Halloween bingo at home with the kids. Use these free printable Halloween Bingo Cards & Calling cards. Then use candy corn or candy pumpkins as your bingo markers.
Halloween Pumpkin Toss
All you need are a few plastic pumpkins and plastic eyeballs or candy pumpkins to toss. Line up the plastic pumpkins in a long row and see how many plastic eyeballs the kids can toss into the pumpkins.
If you do this at a party give out small prizes like plastic spiders, rubber witches’ fingers, or Halloween candy.
Halloween Spider Races
Can you beat your family at racing a spider across the table? All you need to race are plastic spider rings with the ring part cut off, straws, and painter’s tape.
Use a long table or floor area and place a strip of painter’s tape to act as your finish line. Then kids will each take a spider and a straw.
When you say go they will blow air through the straw to push the spider towards the finish line. The first player to get the spider over the finish line wins.
I have used this game at school parties several times and it’s been a huge hit. It also works great at Halloween parties at home.
Tip: If you don’t want to put tape on your table you could also have the winner be the first spider to fall off the end of the table.
Pumpkin Tic Tac Toe Game
Create a DIY Pumpkin Tic Tac Toe game for the kids to play. Create a tick tac toe board on the table with painter’s tape or draw one on a big poster board.
Then get small pumpkins and paint an X or O on the pumpkins or some type of design to distinguish between players. Painting the pumpkins could be a craft to go along with the game before you play too.
You could also use small white pumpkins and small orange pumpkins to designate the player. Now use these pumpkins to play a game of Tic Tack Toe.
Witches Hat Toss
This is a fun and easy game to make with paper plates and poster board. Create a witch’s hat from a black poster board by cutting out a circle for the bottom of the hat and shaping a larger piece into a cone. Then tape the bottom and cone together to create a hat.
Now take a paper plate and cut out the middle portion. This is what kids will toss to go over the witch’s hat.
That’s all you need to do to make a Witches Hat Toss perfect for a Halloween game at home or school party.
Mummy Wrap
All you need for this game is a few rolls of toilet paper. It’s a fun activity when you want some competition.
Divide the family into teams and give each team a roll of toilet paper. 1 child will sit in a seat and become the mummy. When you say go the teams start wrapping the mummy. The team who wraps the whole player’s body first wins.
Pumpkin Bowling
Create a halloween bowling game with pumpkins. Set up plastic water bottles to be the pins you need to knock down. Then have the kids roll smaller pumpkins as the bowling ball. See how many pins you can knock down.
Tip: Do this game outdoors in case it gets messy.
Stack the Ghost Cups
We love this quick Minute To Win It game with a Halloween twist. Get white solo cups or small plastic cups and add sticker googly eyes to the cups. This will make them look like a ghost. You could also just draw with a black marker the eyes.
Players will have 1 minute to stack 21 cups into a pyramid and then take them all down before the minute is up. Whoever does it the fastest wins!
Need More Halloween Games for School Parties? – Best Elementary School Party Games for Kids
Halloween Scavenger Hunt
Get your kids outside with a fun Neighborhood Halloween Scavenger Hunt. Head out on a walk through your neighborhood with our free printable Halloween scavenger hunt and see how many spooky items you can find.
If you want to make it a competition break up into groups and see who can return with the most items checked off their list by your preset end time.
Halloween Color by Number Worksheets
Get into the Halloween spirit with cute Color by Number Halloween Printables. There are 30 Free printable Halloween-themed coloring pages your kids will have a blast creating.
Free Printable Color by Number Halloween Pages
Halloween Would You Rather Game
Get your whole family laughing with funny Would You Rather Halloween Questions. All family-friendly questions to start a conversation at dinner, entertain kids on car rides, or play at Halloween parties.
Grab your free printable Halloween Would You Rather Questions to play today.
Halloween Party Ideas
This is a great time to throw a Halloween celebration at your house. Kids love coming over to celebrate Halloween. Here are some cute ideas to have at your party.
- Best Halloween Costumes Contest
- Halloween Games (listed above)
- Halloween coloring or Halloween crafts
- Watch a Halloween Movie
- Carve Pumpkins together
DIY Outdoor Halloween Decorations
Get into the Halloween spirit by decorating your house with a fun Halloween Theme. I love to create my own DIY Halloween decorations with Dollar Tree items. It’s super cute and no one knows how little you spent on the decorations.
-Add a large Spider web with a spider
-Hang adorable bats from the trees
-Place gravestones on your front lawn
-Put Jack-O-lanterns on the front steps
-Flashing Halloween lights for some spooky fun in your yard
-Hang a Halloween sign on your door or a large plastic Halloween door covering
-Drap Ghost Garland over the front door frame
Indoor Halloween Decorations
Don’t forget to decorate the inside of your house too! Find ideas for indoor Halloween decorations at Dollar Tree too. It’s a great way to save money & decorate for the holidays.
-Put out cute Halloween Signs on your tables or counter
-Make a Vase filled with plastic pumpkins and gords.
-Create a table tray with real pumpkins and gords
-Use fake spider webs to spread across a hallway or corner of a door opening with spiders hanging down.
Halloween Photo Shoot at Home
Create really fun family Halloween photos or videos to share on Instagram, TikTok, or Facebook. Try this super cool Pumpkin Head Photo shoot idea that is the latest trend.
First, have your family carve pumpkins to look like a face. Then add some Halloween-colored smoke to the pumpkin for a spooky effect. Lastly, hold the pumpkin up like it’s your head. It turns out really cool!
Make sure to dress up in your Halloween costumes and pose with your Halloween decorations outside.
Haunted Gingerbread House
Gingerbread houses don’t just have to be for Christmas you can make a spooky Halloween Haunted House too. The whole family can decorate the house together and then use it as a Halloween decoration in your house. That is if the kids don’t eat it first (:
Halloween Bonfire & Scary Stories
Have a bonfire in your backyard and roast marshmallows while telling spooky ghost stories. Let everyone make up a Halloween story to tell. It could be scary or end up being pretty funny to hear the stories your kids create.
Outdoor Pumpkin Hunt
On Halloween Night Host a Night Time Pumpkin Hunt with mini plastic pumpkins and battery-operated tea lights. You can hide them all over the yard and then send the kids to find them. See who can bring back the most pumpkins.
If you want to do a Daytime pumpkin hunt do the same thing but instead of putting lights inside the pumpkins add Halloween candy. It’s just like an Easter egg hunt but for pumpkins instead.
Scary Movies – Halloween Movie Marathon
Pick a night to stay in with the kids and have a Halloween-themed Movie Marathon. There are tons of fun Halloween movies for kids ranging from scary to cute. Here are some ideas:
- It’s the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown
- Ghostbusters
- Toy Story Tower of Terror
- Hocus Pocus (Hocus Pocus 2 coming to Disney+ Sept. 30th)
- Beetlejuice
- Lego Star Wars Terrifying Tales – not a terrifying movie (:
- The Adams Family
- The Goonies
Pumpkin Carving
Visit your local pumpkin patches to find the best pumpkin. Then bring it home to carve into fun Halloween shapes. We like to use pumpkin carving stencils to help guide us while we are carving.
Roast Pumpkin Seeds
While you’re carving your pumpkins save the pumpkin seeds to roast. This is one of our family’s favorite Halloween traditions. I like this pumpkin seed recipe from allrecipies.com
Bake Pumpkin Cookies
You’ll love the smell of pumpkin cookies baking in the oven as yummy Halloween treats.
Try this super easy recipe for Pumpkin Cookies with only 3 ingredients. The kids will love helping with these so make it into a fun fall kids activity.
Zoom Costume Party
Let your kid show off their Halloween costume to family and friends who live far away at a Halloween Zoom Party. This is a great way to include the grandparents who can’t be in person to see the kids on Halloween night.
Get ideas on how to throw a zoom costume party in Fun Social Distancing Ideas for Halloween. Plus other safe Halloween activities to try if we need to stay inside again this October.
Don’t forget to decorate the wall behind where you sit on Zoom to give the call a party vibe. Even just hanging some black and orange streamers and a Halloween sign would be fun.
You’ve Been Booed
A fun Halloween tradition to do with your neighbors is the You’ve Been Booed game. Families fill a cute Halloween bag with candy and leave it on their friend’s porch with a You’ve Been BOOED tag.
The family who receives it passes it forward by creating a gift bag of their own to leave on another friend’s porch.
It’s a fun surprise the kids in your neighborhood will love! Grab your Free Printable You’ve Been Booed Sign.
DIY Haunted Houses
Turn your living room into a haunted house by using the furniture to make a tent maze.
Throughout the maze add in some spooky skeletons, plastic spiders, bats, witches’ cauldron, and any other Halloween items you have at home. You can use cotton balls spread out as spider webs for kids to crawl through too.
This is a great alternative for younger children as the big haunted houses can be too scary.
Spider Obstacle Course.
Create an obstacle course in your house or backyard using white string as a huge spider web. Wrap the string around the chairs, and tables. Anywhere you need the kids to go around the house.
Halloween Sensory Bin
Create a DIY Sensory bin with a halloween theme at home. All you need is a larger plastic bin and small halloween items. Here are a few ideas for items to add to the sensory bin.
Candy Corn
Cotton Spider Webs
Spider Rings
Fake Eye Balls
Small Plastic Black Cats
Witches Fingers
Uncooked White or Black Bean (base of your sensory bin)
Fun Halloween Crafts
Get the kids into the Halloween spirit with some fun Halloween crafts at home. It’s the perfect Halloween activity to keep your kids excited about the holiday.
Pumpkins – Let kids paint a paper plate orange when it dries glue on cut-out construction paper to make a nose and mouth then glue on googly eyes. Finish the top with a green stem.
Spiders – Make a large circle by wrapping two pipe cleaners for the body. Cut small legs out of a black pipe cleaner. Glue the pipe cleaners’ legs to the body of the spider.
Monsters & Bats – Wrap a paper towel or toilet paper roll with construction paper. Glue on googly eyes and cut out construction paper shapes for the mouth, teeth, and crazy hair to make monsters. To make bats, glue on construction paper wings.
Ghosts – Place a white napkin over a lollipop. Then tie a ribbon under the lollipop to make it look like a ghost. Use a marker to draw eyes and then tie up the ghost to hang from the ceiling.
Leaf Collage – A super easy halloween craft that also gets your kids outside. Collect colorful leaves in your backyard or on a family walk. Then paste them onto a large piece of construction paper to make a leaf collage.
Find cheap Halloween crafts at Dollar Tree too!
Halloween Slime
Kids will have so much fun making pumpkin slime. You can find tons of recipes on Pinterest to make the slime. The best part is after the kids play with it you can have it hanging out of your pumpkins to make them look like they are exploding.
Bonfire & Ghost Stories
Have a bonfire in your backyard to roast marshmallows and tell spooky ghost stories. Let the kids make up some silly ghost stories it will have everyone laughing.
Halloween Jewelry
Let the kids make necklaces and bracelets with halloween colored beads. This is great for younger kids to practice fine motor skills at home. While older kids will just enjoy chatting with friends while stringing the beads. We found this set of Halloween beads & charms that would be perfect to use at home.
Bobbing for Apples
This fall activity is an oldy but a goody. Get a huge plastic bin and fill it with water then add in apples. Have the kids put their hands behind their backs and see how many apples they can pick up with their teeth.
This could be a kids vs parents competition too!
Musical Chairs
Play a halloween version of Musical Chairs by listening to funny to spooky Halloween songs. It’s a super easy Halloween game to set up and play with friends at a Halloween party at home.
Ghost Pinata
The kids will have so much fun trying to get the candy out of the Ghost Pinata.
Halloween Books
Add reading time to your Halloween fun! Go to the library or buy some fun Halloween books you can read together as a family or the kids can read on their own.
Halloween Karaoke
Have a blast singing your favorite halloween songs with a fun Halloween Karaoke night with your family.
Face Painting
Let the kids do face painting at home. You can paint pumpkins, spiders, boxy Frankenstein, or ghosts. Older kids can do this on their own in the bathroom mirror while young kids might need your help.
Halloween Activities in Your Area
Look for fun halloween events your family can attend in your area. Here are some fun ideas of things to do near you.
Apple Picking
Take the kids apple picking and then make caramel apples or no bake apple slice cookies at home.
Corn Maze
Take the kids to a local corn maze and work together as a family to find your way out.
Pumpkin Patch
Head to your local pumpkin patch to find Pumpkins to carve or paint. Make sure to grab some little pumpkins to paint with black or white paint to decorate your house with too.
Haunted House
Embrace this spooky season by going to a Haunted House. Find out beforehand how scary it really is. Often at local pumpkin patches, they will have an age-appropriate haunted house.
Visit a Botanical Gardens
Head to a Botanical Garden to see the fall flowers, pumpkins, and gourds growing.
Go to the Zoo
Many of the Zoos host a Boo at the Zoo event where kids can wear their costumes around the zoo and trick or treat. They’ll also love watching the animals play with pumpkins this time of year.
Fun Fall Kids Activities
Let’s get you a few more fun fall activities you can do with your kids this year. Check out our Holiday Page to find the latest ideas for Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and more.
First Grab this Free Printable Fall Bucket List to give you inspiration for fun things to do this fall with kids.
60 Awesome Things to Do in the Fall with Kids. Plan your whole fall season with the kids!
Find out How to Make Cheap Fall Decorations from Dollar Tree That Look Expensive.
Visit a National Park to See the Fall Leaves – Best National Parks to See Before Your Kids Turn 18
Easy Elementary School Party Games. – Quick & easy game ideas for school Halloween & Winter Break parties
Halloween Bingo – Free Printable Bingo Cards
Thanksgiving Color by Number Printables – 30 Free printable coloring pages
Thanksgiving Would You Rather Questions – Free Printable Game
20 Easy Minute to Win It Games for Kids – Quick 1 minute challenges for the whole family
Don’t forget to get ready for Christmas too! 40 Fun Christmas Activities for Families and the Ultimate Printable Christmas Planner to get you organized for a stress-free holiday season.
I hope you have found a few fun Halloween activities at home to try with your kids this year. It’s such a great time of year for families to spend time together.
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Bonus, you’ll get our free printable Halloween Bingo Cards to use at your next party or family game night.
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