Halloween!
As a parent, the scariest part of Halloween is dealing with all that candy...
“It’s as much fun to scare as to be scared.” —Vincent Price
It’s that time! Actually, in my house we’ve been talking about costumes for several months now, and the kids seem to have finally settled on something (two Tinkerbells and a Spiderman), and actually even if they haven’t, the deadline for changing minds has passed. Okay. Let’s get to it.
What you’ll find in the Halloween Guide:
Halloween Books, plus more Scary Stories
Snack Time: Witches Brew (and more!)
Invitation to Play: Thumbprint Pumpkin Patch
Invitation to Play: Monster Masks
Plus Halloween poems and songs, Halloween videos, yummy snacks that involve more fruit than candy, and even some post-Halloween ideas to keep the fun times going (included what to do with that rotting jack-o-lantern). Download and print the guide to get all the tricks and treats!
Guides are available to all subscribers for 1 month after they come out, and then they go into the archive which is available to paid subscribers.
Halloween books and scary stories to read with your kids.
This list includes sweet and silly Halloween books, and it also includes books that are a little bit spooky or scary - I’ve separated them out so you can choose what’s best for your kids (mine love the scary stuff 🤷♀️). In total there are 23 books here, and honestly, we love them all.
Not-So-Scary Halloween Books:
No Such Thing by Ella Bailey
Humbug Witch by Lorna Balian
The Pomegranate Witch by Denise Doyen, illustrated by Eliza Wheeler
Go Away, Big Green Monster! by Ed Emberley
The Witch’s Hat by Tony Johnston, illustrated by Margot Tomes
A Spoonful of Frogs by Casey Lyall, illustrated by Vera Brosgol
The Little Ghost Who Was a Quilt by Riel Nason, illustrated by Byron Eggenschwiler
It’s Halloween by Jack Prelutsky, illustrated by Marylin Hafner
The Hallo-Wiener by Dav Pilkey
Ten Orange Pumpkins by Stephen Savage
Big Pumpkin by Erica Silverman, illustrated by S.D. Schindler
The Scariest Book Ever by Bob Shea
A Little Bit Spooky Books for Halloween:
10 Spooky Pumpkins by Gris Grimly
The Vanishing Pumpkin by Tony Johnston, illustrated by Tomie dePaola
There’s A Nightmare in My Closet by Mercer Mayer
By the Light of the Halloween Moon by Caroline Stutson, illustrated by Kevin Hawkes
The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything by Linda Williams, illustrated by Megan Lloyd
Scary Stories for Halloween (just a little scary!):
The Perfect Pumpkin Pie by Denys Cazet
Bony Legs by Joanna Cole, illustrated by Dirk Zimmer
The Spider and the Fly by Tony DiTerlizzi
Do Not Open by Brinton Turkle
Boo Stew by Donna L. Washington, illustrated by Jeffrey Ebbeler
Heckedy Peg by Audrey Wood, illustrated by Don Wood
I don’t use affiliate links but I’ve linked to Amazon for the sake of convenience. I highly recommend supporting small businesses through Bookshop.org, or buying gently used books from AbeBooks, ThriftBooks, and eBay, or stop by your local public library and see what they have to offer.
Did I miss your favorite Halloween book or scary story? Share in the comments below.
A little Shakespeare for Halloween.
Song of the Witches from Macbeth, Act IV, Scene 1
by William Shakespeare
Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg and howlet’s wing,—
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
Scale of dragon; tooth of wolf;
Witches’ mummy; maw and gulf
Of the ravin’d salt-sea shark;
Root of hemlock digg’d i’ the dark;
Cool it with a baboon’s blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.I also love the spooky song version from Harry Potter. Listen HERE.
That is so interesting!
No horror movies or true crime stories here - just some fun and interesting and sometimes funny links for you to pique your grown-up curiosity about Halloween and Halloween-y things. Enjoy!
➵ Read: Adult Halloween is Stupid, Embarrassing, and Very Important (The Atlantic) “When I was a kid, fun felt really fun…The absolute peak, though, was Halloween. I can still recall bounding down the sidewalk in the cool October air, chuffed to be up late, drunk on the maniacal power that comes from knocking on strangers’ doors and demanding candy.”
➵ Listen: Fearless (Invisibilia) There are some great episodes in this NPR podcast’s archives, including this one about fear. It starts off with the rare case of a woman who cannot feel fear, and then looks at whether it’s possible for the rest of us to “turn off” fear.
➵ Watch: Extreme Pumpkin Carver (WSJ) “My name is Ray Villafane, I’m a sculptor. And each fall, I play with some pumpkins.” (These are so cool.)
➵ Read: Do You Have a Toddler or Is Your House Haunted by the Ghost of the Widow of an 1800s Sea Captain? (McSweeney’s)
➵ Watch: Sounds of the Nightmare Machine (Great Big Story) “What happens when a horror movie composer and a guitar maker join forces? They create the world’s most disturbing musical instrument, affectionately known as The Apprehension Engine.”
➵ Read: Witch Houses of the Hudson Valley (New Yorker) “Witch bottles, with their unusual mix of bodily fluids, hair clippings, and metallic substances combined, according to principles drawn from medicine, astrology, and sympathetic magic, may have been thought to act as curatives that could bring a home’s residents longevity and health.”
I hope you loved the Halloween Guide! If you’re craving more ways to embrace the fall season, be sure to check out the recent Autumn Guide too. And for more Discovery & Play Guides, click this green button for the full archive.
Stay cool, ghosts and ghouls!
Love, Kathryn
🎃👻🎃💀🎃🕷️🎃🧙♀️🎃
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