13 Halloween Arts and Crafts Ideas for the Whole Family

Halloween is one of our favorite holidays because it signifies the beginning of fall, which means sipping hot apple cider in the evenings, going for hayrides with the family and, of course, picking out the perfect pumpkin from the pumpkin patch. Halloween is also the start of the holiday season, getting everyone into the spirit of hanging with friends and family and enjoying the cooler weather. This year, try some of these Halloween arts and crafts ideas to keep your kids entertained and have some adorable homemade decorations around the house. 

The Best Halloween Arts and Crafts Ideas for the Whole Family

Diamond Art Painting

We may be a bit biased, but diamond art painting is absolutely one of our favorite fun things to do with the family at home. It’s easy to work on one large project together, or you can each select your own individual project. Make time every few days or once a week to have the whole family sit down and start painting more of your project. If you have very young children in your home, it’s probably best to work on the project as a family so that you can help properly place the drills and prevent them from misusing the small beads. Diamond art painting can be extremely beneficial for adults, as crafting helps to ease our minds and reduce feelings of anxiety and depression. For children, diamond painting actually helps to build up their creativity and their fine motor skills, so it’s a win-win for everyone!

Our Favorite Halloween-Themed Diamond Art Kits

In the spirit of the holiday, Diamond Art Club has added a very new seasonal design for kids and adults. Check out these canvases and select a few for your new home decorations. 

• Halloween Haunted House: This spooky, limited edition design is sure to liven up your living room this Halloween. Complete with creepy cobwebs, light up jack-o-lanterns and an eerie, shiver-worthy haunted house, this diamond art kit is a full square drill canvas.
• Bubble, Bubble, Chocolate Trouble: An adorable depiction of two baby dragons brewing up some tasty hot chocolate in their shared cauldron, Bubble, Bubble, Chocolate Trouble is the perfect project to get the kids involved. You can even warm up your own delicious mugs of cocoa to sip while you work.
• Scaredy Cats: Two cuddly black cats peer out into the night from behind a creepily grinning jack-o’-lantern in this fun Halloween-inspired design by Jeff Hanie. It’s the perfect picture to hang by your door as a decoration or put in the kids’ room to show off their artistic talents.
• Izzy, The Beekeeper Witch: This design takes a little more of a cutesy approach to Halloween, replacing the creepy fog and unsettling haunted house with an adorable autumn-themed character named Izzy, who doubles as a beekeeper and a witch!

More Halloween Arts and Crafts Ideas

Marshmallow Ghost Stamps

Kids love to do a craft that they can eat, which is why you’ll probably want to have plenty of extra marshmallows on hand for this one. All you need, besides marshmallows of course, is white paint, toothpicks, a straw, scissors and black construction paper. You’ll need to make sure that you get the square marshmallows from the store. Use the scissors to cut the marshmallows into a ghost shape and then use the straw to carve out two eyes and a spooky, open mouth. Insert the toothpicks into the back of your new stamp, dip it into the paint and you’ve got yourself some homemade ghost stamps.

Pumpkin Garland

This is a quick, easy craft that will make for the perfect indoor decorations. Simply get some orange construction paper and use a template or free draw a pumpkin. Cut out each pumpkin and either draw or cut out a jack-o’-lantern smile on each. Feel free to get creative and make each pumpkin unique. Then, use a hole puncher to punch a single hole at the top of the pumpkin and thread cute burlap rope through the hole. Be sure to tie a knot by the hole to prevent the pumpkins from sliding around. Continue doing this until your garland is the desired length.

DIY Trick or Treat Bags

As a kid, the best part of Halloween is definitely seeing how much candy you’ve raked in after a long night of trick or treating. But, in order to get the most candy possible, you need to have the perfect bag. This year, get your kids ready for Halloween by having a night where each person designs and creates their own candy bag that they can carry around on Halloween. There’s a lot of room for creativity here. We recommend using sturdy, fabric bags that can be found at craft stores or online because this material will be more equipped to support heavy loads of candy over alternatives like plastic or paper. Help the kids plan out their designs in pencil first and then use fabric paint or markers to create the perfect trick or treating bag. 

Lollipop Ghosts

An easy and fun thing to do with the family, these adorable lollipop ghosts only require white coffee filters or tissues (whichever is more readily available), ribbon, a black Sharpie and, of course, lollipops of your choosing. Simply cover the lollipop with the tissue or the coffee filter and then tie Halloween-colored ribbons beneath the ghost’s “head” (the base of the lollipop). Use your Sharpie to add two eyes and you’ll have the cutest candies on the block.

Mason Jar Mummy Candles

Nothing adds to your outdoor decorations like these spooky DIY mummy Mason jars to light the path to your door. You can place these on the front steps, your porch or the path to your drive to help lead trick or treaters in the right direction. Purchase a set of Mason jars and then wrap medical gauze around the jars to mimic the appearance of a mummy. Glue the gauze down to keep it extra secure and add googly eyes. You can put real or battery-operated candles inside the jars to add a little bit of spooky light.

Popsicle Stick Frankenstein

For some reason, kids tend to love popsicle stick crafts. Maybe it’s because it awakens their creativity with all the possibilities. Either way, this is the perfect popsicle craft to keep them occupied. Line up your popsicle sticks vertically to create Frankenstein’s head. Glue each possible stick together side-by-side and one horizontal stick on the back about a third of the way from the bottom to act as the screws in his neck. Once the glue has dried, it’s time to paint. You can make a traditional Frankenstein-looking monster or make your own version of a creepy monster.

Toilet Paper Roll Candy Poppers

This is actually a craft you can do any time of the year with the theme of your choosing, but in the spirit of Halloween, you can make candy poppers with a touch of fall. You’ll need to gather a collection of empty toilet paper cardboard rolls. We try to save a few of ours when we notice the roll is done so that there are always cardboard rolls on hand, but you can also buy these online or at a local craft store. Now, you’ll lay the roll over a piece of tissue paper. To stick with the theme, it should be orange, black or Halloween-patterned tissue paper. Stuff the roll with the candy of your choice, tape the tissue paper to the roll, roll up the rest of the cardboard and tape it down again. Then, tie both ends with ribbon (making it look kind of like a Tootsie Roll) and decorate the outside any way you please!

Green Slime

Here’s another great craft to do year-round. As most parents know, kids love any activity that involves making a mess. Luckily, slime is actually pretty easy to clean up—but don’t tell the kids that. You’ll find dozens of different slime recipes on the internet, but this is a simple one that will get the job done quickly. Pour a bottle of classic white glue that you would use in school into a bowl. Then, in a separate container, add one teaspoon of Borax to one cup of warm water. Stir well. In the bowl with the glue, you can add any color you’d like. For Halloween, we’ve chosen green, but feel free to use any color you prefer. After you’ve mixed in the color, you’re going to slowly pour a small amount of your borax and water mixture into the glue and stir. Keep adding little bits of the borax mixture until the slime has formed and is no longer sticky to touch.

Note: Borax is the most easily accessible activator for this craft, but you can use any type of liquid starch to make your slime. 

Halloween Magnets

You probably already have all the supplies you need right at home to create these fun, seasonal magnets. Help your kids pick out large, flat rocks from the yard and then set up an area to paint. You and your children can get creative on what types of spooky characters you’re going to paint. Carefully paint the rocks and allow them time to dry. (Hint: Googly eyes make a fun addition when possible.) After the rocks are completely dry, it’s time to turn them over and glue a small, round magnet to the back. Once the glue dries, they’re ready to stick right on your refrigerator!

Milk Carton Pumpkin Lanterns

A craft that also promotes recycling? We love to see it! Take your empty milk cartons and clean out the inside well in the sink or outside with the hose and remove the label. Cut a palm-sized hole in the back–where it will be hidden–so that you can fit a light inside. Dry the carton off and begin painting the outside orange with the jack-o’-lantern expression of your choice. (Hint: This craft can also be done with a ghost design instead.) After the paint has dried, add a short strand of battery-powered string lights or tealights to the inside of the lantern. Your lanterns are now ready to be displayed.

Painted Pumpkins

Everyone looks forward to carving pumpkins as Halloween approaches, but there are a couple of issues with this classic craft: it’s messy and the pumpkins rot fast. And, some kids hate the odd texture of the squishy pumpkins (of course, some kids absolutely love this stuff and its potential to make a mess). If you want to add some cute decorations to your front porch or inside your home without worrying that the pumpkins with rot before Halloween, try painting your pumpkins instead. This is a great way to prevent that usual mess and add some super creative pumpkins to your decorations. 

Pro Tip: For a really interesting pumpkin craft, you can glue bits of broken crayons to the top of the pumpkin near the stem. Then, set your blow dryer to high heat and use it to melt the crayons. This creates a unique, colorful dripping design to your pumpkin! To make the colors stand out even more, paint the pumpkin white first and allow it to dry before adding the crayons. 

Cotton Ball Ghosts

A quick easy craft you can do with young children, cotton ball ghosts simply require googly eyes, cotton balls, glue and construction paper. Cut out the shape of a ghost on your white construction paper. Then, use white glue or a glue gun to attach the cotton balls to the paper. Add your googly eyes last, and you can even punch a hole through the paper on the top if you want to hang your adorable little ghouls.

Get into the Spooky Spirit with These Awesome Crafts

With fall just around the corner, it’s time to prepare for Halloween! The kids have picked out their costumes and the stores are filled with supersized bags of candy, so bring the fun of the holiday into your own home with these Halloween arts and crafts ideas. We promise you and your children will have a blast working on projects–from spooky diamond art paintings for kids to whipping up batches of slime. You can even use many of these ideas to create your own unique home decorations with a personal twist.

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