Now, the problem is, where to start?

Easy Halloween crafts

We’re not talking start from scratch craft ideas here (we have those elsewhere on the site). Instead, there are some nice bits at Yellow Moon which allow your kids to be creative, but not have to get so deep into something that it never gets finished.

Here are just a few of the fun ideas that stood out for me…

Halloween gift bags and gift boxes

It’s always nice to receive a gift, so why should Halloween be any different? And if you want to give someone a special something (be it something genuinely nice, or a nasty surprise) you want it to be presented in the best possible way.

Here are two kits that would make the tackiest gifts look good.
With the gift boxes, each kit contains a coloured card craft box, pre-cut foam pieces and wiggle-eyes. There are 4 designs with a pumpkin, cat, bat and spider and they’re all pretty cute. They’re 6cm in diameter and would be perfect for say… and engagement ring or perhaps part of a severed finger… Or just some sweets I guess.

The bags are a similar deal with 4 designs again (witch, pumpkin, spider and bat) and the same kind of materials for the face parts. The bags themselves are paper and would make excellent party bags or of course trick or treating bags. The bags also offer a bit more freedom with the design as there are more bits to stick on.

They’re good value both coming in (at the time of writing) at around £3-£4 a pack.

Halloween 3D decorations and scratch art

If you’re looking for some nice Halloween crafts to decorate the place with, then a quick win would be the 3D shapes.
No doubt you’ll have seen this kind of thing before. In fact Asda are selling some similar 3D Halloween decorations right now. They’re pretty cheap, but are they HAND-MADE BY YOUR OWN CHILD? No, I didn’t think so. But these items from Yellow Moon could be.
Coming with 3 assorted designs, they come flat, and once opened up can be painted and decorated however you like. They come with the ribbon to hang them with and you can even buy suitable paints from the same site, which is convinient.

The scratch art stuff is cool. These black shapes look pretty spooky out of the packet, but when you scratch away the matt black surface, you reveal the colourful second layer. This allows for some really cool effects and makes for some nice colourful yet terrifying wall decorations.
Best of all, these ones are also magnetic, so you can stick them on your fridge with ease!
Oh, and you get a scratch tool to do the scratching with – essential!

 
Halloween window huggers and tattoos!

If you’re still in the mood for decorating (can you EVER have enough Halloween decorations?) how about trying some ‘make them yourself’ window huggers?
They’re made of card and the idea is that you colour them in, stick them together, then put them on the window using the suction hooks provided. Suction hooks are good because unlike the ‘sticky’ window hugging competition, they will be far more re-usable and so can come back out next year, and potentially many more after that.
Each pack makes 12 huggers which is pretty good for £3.

And when you’ve run out of space on the walls and windows, why not decorate yourselves with these cool Halloween tattoos. Don’t worry, they’re only the temporary ones, so you won’t have to regret the decision for years afterwards.
There are 12 designs in each pack ranging from the cute little ghost to the more rugged and intimidating skull and crossbones. Plus one pack contains 36, YES 36 tattoos!

Halloween finger puppets

Finally, why not entertain your guests with your Halloween crafts too?
Puppet shows always get a crowd going, so put your fingers to good use first making the puppets, then helping the puppets to walk about convincingly on stage!
The first set comes with 6 designs and includes all of your favourite Halloween characters. You can use felt-tipped pens to do the colouring, then it’s just down to you to provide the voices and motivation.
The puppets are a decent size too, at 11cm.

But if you’ve had enough of all the Halloween crafts stuff, why not opt for the ready made, glow in the dark finger puppets?
There are three cute characters to choose from and they would all look great in the dark, or even better, under a UV light. You could even go all out with some glow in the dark paint to create an especially spooky stage for them, but I’ll leave the rest of the creative thinking to you. That’s the point of Halloween crafts after all isn’t it?

Even better than the posters Richard Beardy Branson and his cronies have unleashed Don’t Go Zombie, onto the world a great game which uses Google Street View to turn your area into a zombie horror movie.
Game play lets you zap zombie drivers wandering your street and save their souls by transporting them onto trains. With three difficulty levels to choose from this game is great fun and will keep you more than occupied over a work lunch break or 13.

Vampire Kittens is a flash game on the E4 web-site, the object of which is quite simple. Kick your blood sucking kitten as far as you can to get the most points.
To start, you control the power that the dismembered leg puts into the punt, (hopefully) sending the long toothed kitten high into the sky.
Unfortunately for the kitten, they don’t have the ability to fly (most vampires do) but they are vulnerable to all kinds of vampire attack, such as stake through the heart and garlic, which is a bit unfair on animal.

You can boost or slow the progress of the flying feline as it bounces along. And there are bonuses that can also speed up or slow down your progress.
Shame there isn’t an actual leaderboard – I was quite good. Still, good fun!

Have a go yourself: Vampire Kitten

Great isn’t it? I love this sharing of traditions. I know that a lot of people do like to keep to the old methods of celebration, but pinatas are excellent for parties.

If you don’t know much about them, they’re huge, hollow paper mache objects. You fill them with sweets and then take turns to smash them open with a stick. Oh, and the catch being that you have to wear a blindfold when doing it.
There is obviously a lot of scope for injury and destruction of household objects, but what’s Halloween without a bit of danger eh?

I found a cool web-page explaining everything you need to know, and giving some good example Halloween pinatas for you to look at.
They do sell them in the UK and across Europe (as well as the Americas, obviously), so you should be able to find them wherever you are.
You could even make your own. That would probably be more fun wouldn’t it?

Mouse of the dead

This game is very slick. Somehow they manage to mix real-time video with funky cartoon graphics to create a really abosrbing shoot-em-up game.
You control this hero mouse thing, and you basically go around shooting the zombie mice, bats and anything else that looks nasty. There are lots of cool weapons to pick up, and you get a great deal of satisfaction from blowing all of those nasty little baddies away.
It is kind of hard, but the controls are simple, just point and shoot!

Mouse of the Dead


More Zombies

Zombies love to eat brains. We all know that. But did you know that they also like hot dogs? Well, they do. In More Zombies, you play as a hot dog stall owner who has to fight to protect his beloved sausages from being destroyed by waves of the undead.
You have a load of weapons to choose from, and have the ability to switch between melee weapons and ones that shoot. You also have full control over the movement of your character as he has to protect his stall from all angles – which makes it quite a challenge.
There’s lots of gore, explosions and heavy guitar music to enjoy, so what are you waiting for? Get stuck in!

More Zombies