15 Fun Halloween Activities for Toddlers and Preschoolers

Halloween with little kids doesn’t need to be scary to be magical. 🎃✨

For toddlers and preschoolers, some of the best Halloween memories are often the simplest ones. Decorating a wonky pumpkin. Dressing up at home for absolutely no reason. Making something covered in far too many stickers. Taking a favourite toy trick-or-treating.

If you’re looking for Halloween activities for toddlers and preschoolers, we’ve gathered 15 easy ideas filled with play, creativity and just the right amount of Halloween magic.

No frights required.

1. Decorate Pumpkins Without Carving

Pumpkin decorating is a Halloween classic, but sharp carving tools and toddlers aren’t exactly a dream combination.

Instead, let little ones decorate their own pumpkin with washable paint, stickers, pom-poms or markers.

Give them complete creative control. A pumpkin with seven eyes and one ear is still a perfectly good pumpkin.

2. Make a Boo Basket

Start Halloween month with a little surprise.

A Boo Basket for toddlers can be as simple as a favourite Halloween book, some cosy pyjamas, stickers and one special Halloween toy or plush friend.

Leave it somewhere unexpected for them to discover in the morning.

As for who put it there? That part is entirely up to you.

3. Have a Not-So-Spooky Dress-Up Day

Who says costumes are only for October 31?

Fill a basket with simple dress-up pieces such as cat ears, fairy wings, capes, witch hats and masks, then let your little one decide who they’re going to be.

A fairy-witch-cat? Excellent choice.

Dress-up is also a lovely Halloween activity for preschoolers because it encourages children to create their own characters and stories.

A small witch doll with a black dress, pointed witch hat, and black shoes stands on a purple hill against a dark blue paper-cut sky with a gold crescent moon, stars, and bare branches.

4. Go on a Pumpkin Hunt

Hide little pumpkins around the house or garden and send your child off to find them.

Use real mini pumpkins, toy pumpkins or simply cut pumpkin shapes from paper.

For older preschoolers, add clues. For toddlers, pointing enthusiastically in approximately the right direction is completely acceptable.

5. Make a Halloween Sensory Bin

Fill a large container with toddler-safe Halloween treasures to scoop, sort and discover.

Try large pom-poms, fabric scraps, chunky toy pumpkins, wooden scoops and cups.

For younger children, always choose age-appropriate items and avoid anything small enough to be a choking hazard.

6. Have a Halloween Teddy Bears’ Picnic

Ask every guest to come in costume.

And by guests, we mean the dolls and teddies.

Lay out a blanket, add some Halloween snacks and let your little one decide what everyone is wearing.

A Halloween doll or favourite plush friend makes the perfect guest of honour.

A brown plush teddy bear doll wearing a furry animal hood with small ears

7. Make Halloween Biscuits

Little kids don’t care if the biscuits look professional. This is excellent news.

Bake simple biscuits together, then add icing and decorations.

Try pumpkins, moons, stars, cats or witch hats.

The decorating-to-eating ratio will vary considerably.

8. Create Your Own Little Witch’s Potion

This is one of our favourite Halloween activities for preschoolers who love messy play.

Set out bowls or child-safe containers with water, leaves, petals and other safe ingredients, then let your little witch start mixing.

Give everything magical names.

Rose petals become dragon scales. Leaves become forest feathers. Water is obviously moon potion.

What happens when you mix them together?

Only the witch knows.

9. Go on a Halloween Neighbourhood Walk

Halloween decorations are an adventure when you’re three.

Take an afternoon walk around your neighbourhood and see how many pumpkins, cats, witches and ghosts you can spot.

Going before dark can also be a lovely way for children who are nervous about Halloween to enjoy the decorations without everything feeling quite so spooky.

10. Make a Halloween Craft Table

You don’t need an elaborate Pinterest-worthy activity.

Put paper, crayons, washable paint, stickers and glue on the table and let them create.

Make paper pumpkins. Draw friendly monsters. Create a witch. Stick googly eyes onto absolutely everything.

The point isn’t the finished product. It’s the making.

11. Play Trick-or-Treat at Home

For toddlers experiencing their first proper Halloween, practise trick-or-treating before the big night.

Set up different doors around the house, grab a little basket and practise knocking, saying “trick or treat” and collecting a pretend surprise.

Their dolls can have a turn too.

It makes a lovely imaginative game and can help little ones know what to expect when Halloween night arrives.

12. Read Halloween Stories by Torchlight

Choose a few not-too-spooky Halloween books, turn down the lights and read them together by torchlight.

Add blankets, pillows and a favourite cuddly friend.

Bring the same books out every October and you might find that this tiny activity becomes one of the Halloween traditions they remember most.

13. Invite the Switch Witch to Visit

After trick-or-treating, there’s one more little bit of Halloween magic to come.

Meet Willa the Switch Witch.

A plush witch doll with purple hair, a black dress, and striped socks sits against a dark blue starry background with white clouds at the bottom.

Willa tiptoes from doorstep to doorstep, swapping leftover Halloween candy for a little surprise.

Children can choose some of the sweets they’d like to leave for Willa, place them beside their bed or outside their bedroom door, then see what appears in their place by morning.

A book, little toy, pyjamas or Halloween friend makes a lovely swap.

A perfectly sensible arrangement, according to Willa. 🍬✨

14. Take a Halloween Friend Trick-or-Treating

Sometimes everything feels a little easier with a friend beside you.

Let your child choose a favourite doll or plush toy to dress up and bring trick-or-treating.

The Holiday Hollow Boo Bunch are particularly fond of Halloween night.

Mabel Moon puts on her sparkliest tutu and cat mask so she can disguise herself as a trick-or-treater. Wesley Werewolf loves any excuse for a moonlit adventure. And the witches of Holiday Hollow are never very far away when treats are involved.

Who knows what adventures your little one and their Halloween friend might get up to?

15. Start One Halloween Tradition That’s Yours

You don’t need fifteen Halloween activities.

Pick one.

Maybe you make the same pumpkin biscuits every year.

Maybe a Boo Basket mysteriously appears on October 1.

Maybe you always go for a twilight walk to look for pumpkins.

Maybe the Boo Bunch come out of their box with the Halloween decorations and disappear back to Holiday Hollow at the end of October.

Do it again next year.

Then again the year after that.

Because somewhere along the way, a little Halloween activity becomes a tradition.

And those are the bits of childhood magic worth holding onto. 🌙✨

Halloween Activities for 1 to 2 Year Olds

For younger toddlers, keep Halloween activities simple, sensory and familiar.

Pumpkin decorating, Halloween books, neighbourhood walks, music, dress-ups and playing with a soft Halloween toy are all easy ways to introduce the season without overwhelming them.

At this age, Halloween doesn’t need to be an event. Let them explore it through everyday play.

Halloween Activities for 3 to 5 Year Olds

Preschoolers are ready for more imagination.

Try Halloween treasure hunts, potion making, baking, crafts, pretend trick-or-treating and creating stories with dolls and toys.

This is also a wonderful age to introduce simple family traditions. Preschoolers are old enough to anticipate them and young enough for the magic to feel completely real.

How to Make Halloween Fun Without Making It Scary

Follow your child’s lead.

If they love ghosts and monsters, wonderful. If they’d prefer pumpkins, black cats, friendly witches and dressing up as a fairy, that’s Halloween too.

You can trick-or-treat before dark, choose gentle Halloween stories, avoid frightening decorations and focus on the parts children tend to love most: imagination, dressing up, little surprises and being together.

Halloween doesn’t have to be scary to feel magical.

Sometimes all you need is a pumpkin, a little friend and a very good imagination. 🎃🌙✨

Discover Holiday Hollow and meet the Boo Bunch, our not-so-spooky Halloween friends made for little imaginations.