5 Fun DIY Haunted House Ideas to Create for Kids

Do you love Halloween and want to put together a haunted house, but your kids are still young and easily scared? You aren't limited to taking the trick-or-treaters around the neighborhood in their Halloween costumes. You can still enjoy all the spooky fun of the season while still having fun with the kids.

Decorate your entryway, front porch and yard with Jack-o-lanterns and tombstones and try these easy DIY haunted house ideas and Halloween decorations to make the frightful holiday delightful for the whole family!

Most of these haunted house props and Halloween decorating ideas are DIY with supplies and party decor you can pick up at your local grocery or dollar store, so they won't break the bank.

Criss-cross yarn to create a huge spider web that kids can have fun going through like a spy trying to avoid laser beams. Make the web more realistic with some cobwebs made from cotton and hang fake spiders in the web. When you're finished, you can wind up your yarn and use it for another project.

Let toddlers and young kids play in the web during the day. To turn up the fun in the Halloween haunted house for older kids, use neon yarn and then mount black lights or black light flashlights around the area. A fog machine can add even more spooky ambiance to the web.

Have you ever stuck your hand into bowls filled with peeled grapes that feel like eyeballs, chunky gelatin desserts or other sticky, tacky or clammy textured foods? It's a surefire way to get squeals of delight and horror out of your youngsters.

Cut an access panel out of a trifold foam display board and decorate it with foam letters, colorful paper and even paper zombie hands. Then, place your prepared and perplexing foods on the other side of the display panel.

Creating a plank is a fun DIY project you can create with some two-by-four planks of wood. Use a 10-foot-long two-by-four as the beam plus 12-inch scrap pieces of two-by-four to add height. Keep the design simple and straight or make parallel diagonal cuts in your two-by-four and flip the outer two cut pieces before screwing them together. Screw the scrap pieces to the bottom ends of the balance beam to raise it off the ground securely.

One piece of scrap two-by-four under each end of the beam is a great height for toddlers and young kids. Add more scrap pieces under the beam ends for bigger kids who seek death-defying plank walks.

Make sure to decorate with Halloween crafts, like DIY ghouls, ghost silhouettes and other Halloween props to boost the mood.

Holding flashlights under your chin during spooky storytime goes to the next level with face paint and an ultraviolet flashlight. Use bright white face paint or mix face paint with tonic water, which contains the UV-sensitive element quinine that glows blue.

Alternatively, you can mix face paint with olive oil—the fat within the oil can glow yellow to red. You can also make headbands with yarn and neon-colored washi tape to step up the glow during the black light fun.

Using cardboard, plywood or a store-bought foam-core display, draw and then paint a Dracula face with an open, cut-out mouth. Sew a batch of simple, circular bean bags with bat wings, fangs and puffy painted eyes that can be tossed into the vampire's mouth. This basic game can bring a surprising amount of fun to any Halloween party and takes only an afternoon to make.