Staying home for Halloween doesn't have to be scary. We've cooked up lots of ideas for spending an amazing day with your family, starting with some magical meals! Once you're all fuelled up, get moving—we've got lots of ideas for celebrating Halloween together, with plenty of fun for everyone!

Recipes: 

Get fueled up with some of our favourite Halloween recipes! Enjoying a good meal together before your Halloween celebrations will make sure the day stays fun for everyone—so start with our ideas for meals that will power up your kids. Throwing a Halloween feast is also a wonderful way to celebrate at home this year: light your pumpkins and try making some frighteningly good recipes from around the world, or explore autumn food traditions with your child. For kids who want to make food that’s extremely on-theme, make these simple DIY Halloween-themed snacks and pumpkin projects. And for a super simple Halloween cooking project, make monster pancakes! Just add extra blobs to your regular pancakes to make legs or tentacles, then add an eye or three using bananas and blueberries. You can take the same route with monster pizzas (just use your toppings to make scary faces!). To make it a truly enchanted evening, try one of our magical recipes from children’s books. Finally, going virtual is another wonderful way to get everyone involved—light the pumpkins, put on your costumes and enjoy your meal with friends and family from near and far!

Activities: 

Go on a pumpkin-lit treasure hunt: If trick-or-treating is tricky in your area, try an at-home treasure hunt instead. Hide tokens around the house for your kids to find and trade in for tricks or treats (bonus: each kid can have their own tokens to find to keep the hunt fair.) For kids who love a challenge, give them riddles to solve (we like these ready-made clues), or put a few obstacles in place like this spider web! Don’t forget to light your hunt with pumpkins or flashlights. 

Have a cosy readathon: A good book can be a magical experience! For some lovely Halloween-themed reads, try picture books like Room on the Broom or The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything; middle grade books like Bunnicula or the Unicorn Rescue Society books; and for older kids books like Ghosts or The Halloween Tree. For more recommendations for after-dinner reads, we’ve rounded up our favourite kid’s books that involve cooking here. 

Play charades: A classic after-dinner game, charades is a fun way to let everyone act out their costumes, work off some Halloween energy, and have a good laugh! To make sure everyone can play, we love these word lists for younger kids.

Throw a family movie night: Pop some popcorn and pull out your blankets for a cosy night in together. For little ones, try Room on the Broom or It’s The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown. For the spooky-averse, try Kiki’s Delivery Service, a gentle movie about a kind young witch. And for spook-loving kids, try Coco or Spirited Away. Looking for more ideas? We have lots of great food-themed movies for kids and tweens here!

Have a Halloween photo shoot: Get your kids to put on their costumes, and then head outside for a Halloween photo shoot. Let your small astronaut or dragon explore the forest, and let your princess run free through the fields. You’ll capture some amazing memories together and have a ton of fun. To turn it into a family photo shoot, add a few challenges -- you can modify the ones we suggest for our Father’s Day photo hunt, or create your own (who in your family does the best impression of jack o’lanterns around your neighbourhood? There’s only one way to find out...) 

For more great ideas, join our communities on Facebook and Instagram! We're sharing meal inspiration and kids activities to keep you glowing all autumn long.