Halloween is almost here! It’s one of our favorite holidays of the year to celebrate—no presents and stress, just pure joy watching the kiddos dress up as their favorite characters. And, don’t get us started on the school Halloween parades, is there anything better than that? It’s pure joy and happiness seeing the littles all dressed up showing off their costumes. To help you make the most of this magical holiday, we’ve curated a list of 5 fun family halloween activities. Check it out below and add some of these to your schedule this week for a spooktacular time!

1. Vampire Doughnuts—Easy Peasy!

Throwing a Halloween party or bringing treats for your kid’s class? Try making these super easy and super spooky Vampire Doughnuts! What do we love most about these? Making them couldn’t be easier—just grab pre-made doughnuts from your local bakery and red frosting, then stop by the dollar store to get vampire teeth and ‘googly’ eyes. Voila! That’s all the materials you need. Now to assemble your vampire doughnuts, start by adding some red food coloring near the inside of the doughnut hole. Plop in the vampire teeth and add the googly eyes—and you’re done! Yummy tasty Halloween-themed treats in just minutes.

Picture of 4 doughnuts with vampire teeth and googly eyes on a black plate on a table surrounded by other doughnuts.

2. Paint Pumpkins Instead

Want to know a confession? I don’t actually like carving pumpkins. It’s up there with dying Easter eggs—a messy activity that I begrudgingly do every year for the sake of tradition. But alas, fellow mamas who feel the same way, there is a better way! Instead of carving your pumpkins and getting the guts and seeds everywhere, try painting your pumpkins. Your kids will like it just as much (maybe even more) and you’ll get to enjoy a slightly less messy activity. We love getting several small pumpkins to paint each year. You can even add some paper with glue sticks, glitter, or accessories like glasses and hats. Give it a try this year!

Father and daughter painting pumpkins for a halloween activity

3. Oranges Make Delicious & Healthy ‘Pumpkin’ Treats 

We know Halloween isn’t the healthiest holiday—it is founded on the idea of giving out treats and candy to youngsters after all. So, if you’re looking for a healthier treat option to give out this year try: mandarin oranges. These little cuties (pun intended) make for the perfect pumpkin impersonators. Just grab a bag of mandarin oranges and some markers and you’re all set to make these little guys. Draw pumpkin-inspired faces and shapes on them—turning an ordinary mandarin orange into a mini ‘pumpkin’ treat perfect for the holiday! Now you’ll have a delicious and healthy option to pass out to trick-or-treaters who stop by your home.

Man holding a mandarin orange with a painted on pumpkin face

4. Mini Pumpkin Grab Bags

We’ve got another easy idea to bring to a Halloween party or to send your kid to school with: it’s the mini pumpkin grab bag! These little bags can be filled with whatever you like—candy worms like in the picture below or little halloween trinkets like plastic spiders, candy, bouncy balls…whatever! All you need is some orange fabric, cut into 8x8 squares, and some green fabric, cut into 1”x10” long strips. Lay the orange fabric out and place the goodies inside, then gather it up and tie it closed with the green strips of fabric. Finally, take a hot glue gun and carefully wrap the ends of the green fabric around the orange fabric to create a stem. Add glue dots periodically to keep it in place. Tada! A festive little goodie bag perfect for Halloween parties!

Aerial shot of two kids putting together treats inside orange fabric to make pumpkin grab bags


5. Family of Frankensteins

Uhhh…don’t have a costume yet this year? No sweat, we’ve got a perfect last-minute costume idea for the whole family. The best part? To make it requires buying nothing—you can use supplies you already have around the house. Bam, that’s what we’re talking about. Now, ground your expectations in reality; it’s not going to be the picture-perfect Halloween costume you’ll see on an influencer’s Instagram feed, but these family Halloween costumes will still be Insta-worthy (refer to the cute family photo below). Okay enough disclaimers, let’s start making frankenstein costumes for the whole family! Grab some brown paper bags or boxes (preferably with no print), then draw on your Frankenstein face. Be sure to cut out some eyes, add in some badly sewn-up stitches, and a spooky mouth. And, that’s it! In just a few minutes you’ll have a Halloween costume for the whole family.

Image of a family of 4, two adults and two kids, with homemade frankenstein masks made from paperbags


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