Family Halloween night at home: the cosy plan, from costumes to film

A successful family Halloween night doesn't mean you have to leave the house. All you need is a common thread: everyone in a costume they can wear all evening, flame-free decorations, an orange dinner, a few games and a film to finish under the throw. Here's the plan, step by step, for an evening that's a little bit scary, a lot of laughs, and over by bedtime.

Set the scene: the time, the ages, the fright level

Before you think about decorations, decide three things:

• The timing. With children, fit the evening around their usual routine. Starting in the late afternoon leaves time to do everything without turning the next day into a tough one.
• The fright level. Halloween can be funny or frightening. For the youngest, go for silly monsters and smiling pumpkins rather than realistic zombies.
• The budget. A night at home mostly costs whatever you put into costumes and decorations. Everything below works with what you already have, plus one or two pieces that will get used again.

Costumes you can wear all evening

The classic Halloween trap: the costume that itches, pinches or tears before pudding. For a night at home, the best costume is one you can eat dinner in, play on the floor in and fall asleep in during the film.

The hooded one-piece onesie ticks every box. The Pumpkin Onesie, in orange coral fleece with a pumpkin embroidered on the front pocket, sets the theme all on its own. For a whole family, the animal styles join in the fun too: a Shark Kigurumi whose hood "swallows" your head, or the Big Mouth Monster Pyjamas.

To find out all about this kind of outfit, read our article kigurumi: what it is and how to choose one, and our guide to choosing an adult onesie size. For children, check the onesie is the right size, with no legs trailing on the stairs.

A guest turns up with nothing? Our list of last-minute costumes will sort them out in ten minutes.

Decorations that make an impression, without a flame

The Halloween atmosphere is all about the light: a dark room, orange glows, shadows on the walls. To get it safely:

• LED candles in the pumpkins and lanterns, rather than real flames;
• orange fairy lights or a lamp with orange fabric placed well away from the bulb;
• black paper silhouettes (bats, cats, ghosts) stuck to the windows, cut out with the children;
• a carved pumpkin, lit by an LED.

With children and fabric costumes, real candles are the bad idea of the evening. French government services remind people never to leave a candle unattended and not to let children play with naked flames, offering them a torch to play in the dark instead (Pas-de-Calais prefecture, house fires). And the torch happens to be the star accessory of Halloween.

An easy orange dinner

No need to spend hours cooking. The idea: anything orange or with a monster's face.

• Pumpkin or butternut squash soup, served in bowls, with ghost-shaped croutons;
• mini pizzas decorated with black olive spiders;
• peeled clementines with a little piece of celery stuck in the top, to make mini pumpkins;
• a chocolate cake covered in icing sugar "cobwebs".

Get the children to help decorate the plates: it's an activity in itself, and they eat better what they've made.

Three short games to kick off the evening

1. The torchlight sweet hunt. Hide treats around the living room, turn off the lights, hand out the torches. Adjust the hiding places to the height of the littlest one.
2. The monster parade. Everyone presents their character in thirty seconds, with a walk and a roar. Then you vote for the funniest, the scariest, the most original.
3. The mystery ghost. In an opaque bag, objects to identify by touch: cooked spaghetti "brains", a rubber glove filled with cold water as a "ghost hand", a damp sponge. Shivers guaranteed, with nothing genuinely frightening.

For more ideas, our article on a grown-up pyjama party adapts easily once the children are in bed.

The final film, under the throw

The evening ends on the sofa, still in costume. Choose a film where the monsters are more lovable than frightening, and check the age rating before you press play. Keep a gentler alternative up your sleeve in case the littlest one gets scared.

That's where a comfy costume really comes into its own: no need to get changed, the onesie becomes pyjamas. If you'd like to keep the cosy spirit going, our guide to the perfect cosy Sunday has ideas for the next day.

In short

A family Halloween night means timing set around the children, costumes you keep on until the film, LED decorations, an orange dinner made together, three short games and a film chosen for the age of the youngest. And if you'd all like to wear the same outfit, take a look at the Family Fleece Onesie, available in kids', women's and men's sizes, or browse the whole shop.

Cover photo: Robin Jonathan Deutsch / Unsplash