If you’ve tricked out your house in spider webs, ghosts and goblins and your little ones can’t seem to get enough of the gore, it might be time to take them on a scare adventure. From big-league haunted houses to animated farm sheds and farms that offer a bonus corn maze or pumpkin patch, we’ve searched Chicago for the best spots for pint-sized frights with just the right amount of spook for little ones. Read on . . . and get a bit of scream on.
Recommended age: The Haunted Barn is PG13, no one under the age of 12 is permitted without an adult; the giggles in the Fun Farm are open to all ages
Experience the frights of Halloween as you navigate the scary and completely animated Haunted Barn. If you chicken out on walking the Haunted Barn or if you're with little ones who prefer a lot less scare factor, get your giggles on in the animated Fun Barn.
Museum of Science and Industry's Boo Fest is two weeks of family friendly science experiments that will get you in the Halloween spirit! Explore specially decorated exhibits, examine the science of Halloween with pumpkin drops and slime, try your hand at cow eyeball dissection and more.
5700 S. Lake Shore Dr., Hyde Park; Online: msichicago.org
Goebbert's Pumpkin Farm Haunted House - Pingree Grove
Recommended age: Appropriate for school-age kiddos
Take a walk on the spooky side with twists and turns through this haunted adventure. Bring a cozy sweater, because there are thrills and chills that will leave your spine-tingling.
Goebbert's Pumpkin Farm Haunted House - South Barrington
Recommended age: Appropriate for school-age kiddos
Make no mistake, friends, this 10-room house is designed for kids, but it's not for those who don't like to be big-time spooked. So, be ready to walk it with kiddos jumping on your back like scaredy-dog Scooby Doo.
Recommended age: Ghosts and goblins 12 & under; Haunted barn recommended for ages 11 & up.
While Sonny Acres has a haunted hayride and barn appropriate for those who don't mind the daylights being scared out of them, they also have a Spook Shed and daytime hayrides perfect for little ones who'd just like to dip their toes into Halloween fun. The shed is completely automated with no actors.
Recommended age: This fear fest is for kids 8-years-old and up. It is not recommended for younger children. Or their scaredy-cat parents.
The creepy-crawlies come out on two of the darkest nights of the year, Oct. 15 & 16, and you don’t want to miss the terrifying fun at Naper Settlement. Naper Settlement will transform into an eerie and bizarre wonderland, featuring spine-chilling attractions and interactive experiences. View performances by magician Steve Chezaday, take a stroll through a zombie maze, browse the mysterious dark art gallery, play a game of laser tag and rock out to monster jams.
Guests can stroll around Meadow Lake to view scarecrows created by local scout troops and school groups all throughout the month of October. After your walk, vote for your favorite scarecrow in the visitors center.
Great Wolf Lodge is embracing the spooky season with the return of their annual month-long Howl-O-Ween celebration, running Oct. 1-31. This year's activities include Trick-Or-Treat Trail, The Thrill of Howl-O-Ween Yoga Tails, Monster Bash Dance Party and Critter Cartoons, just to name a few.
Recommended age: The Forge has a Fear Factor Scale on their website for each activity so you can best figure out which work best for your family
The Forge: Lemont Quarries is inviting all to the largest outdoor adventure course in North America. This fall, in addition to their regular activities, they will host Fear Month to celebrate the change of seasons. The month includes family movie nights, zombie tag, fireside ghost stories and more.
Museum of Illusions is decking out its space with themed decor for Halloween, making it a go-to destination for the holiday. Playing into the illusions throughout the exhibits, such as their well-known Head on a Platter, Vortex Tunnel, Infinity and Anti-Gravity Room and more, the decorations will serve as a great backdrop.
EDITOR'S NOTE: CLOSED DUE TO COVID FOR THE 2021 SEASON
Recommended age: Regular haunts recommended for ages 10 & up; parents discretion for "Lights On" experience
Scream Scene has been famously terrifying visitors since 1997 with its insane clown maze, crazed butchers and chainsaw maniacs. However, they tone it down for two days only so little ones can experience the fun with a "Lights On" performance they won't soon forget.
Disney+’s Hallowestream has finally arrived! The streaming provider is kicking off the season with an new Halloween-inspired LEGO special, LEGO Star Wars Terrifying Tales, and you can watch now!
The animated special celebrates the dark side of the galaxy and packs plenty of names and voices Star Wars fans know and love. Expect to hear Tony Hale, Christian Slater, Jake Green, Dana Snyder and many more. Now you can also get your first look at the official trailer, which features Darth Vader’s loyal servant Vaneé (Hale) spinning three spooky stories.
LEGO Star Wars Terrifying Tales takes place after The Rise of Skywalker and follows Poe and BB-8 as they make an emergency landing on the volcanic planet Mustafar. Here they meet Graballa the Hutt who is renovating Darth Vader’s castle into an all-inclusive luxury hotel (comedy abounds).
Along with Graballa’s mechanic, Dean, the characters head deep into the castle and listen to spooky stories about artifacts and villains across the galaxy. Can Poe and BB-8 quash an “ancient evil” from coming back to life and escape the spooky hotel?
The only way to find out is to watch starting today on Disney+.
If Andie seems familiar, that’s because she was the former LA Editor before she moved to Amsterdam. Two years later, she’s back and thrilled to be covering the LA market again, as well as national and personal stories for the site. When she’s not checking out new travel destinations, events, museums and restaurants to keep her and her kids entertained, she can be found wandering around flea markets and thrift stores looking for cool vintage finds—not a hard thing to do in and around Los Angeles. Follow along with her adventures on Instagram!
Favorite place to play outdoors: Malibu Tide Pools at Surfrider Beach. Whether it’s cool or warm, there are always a ton of surfers to watch out on the ocean, you can often see dolphins, and of course, climb around the tide pools to discover local sea life.
Favorite thing to do on a rainy day: LACMA, Natural History Museum or the California Science Center.
Favorite street for an afternoon of fun: Grand Street Park. It has a massive splash pad where you can either get just your toes wet or do a full-body splash, not to mention, it has convenient bathrooms. There’s usually some sort of festival taking place in the park too so you can always wander around for great music and great food. It’s always a favorite destination, any time of the day, any day of the year.
Do you have a go-to restaurant you like to take the kids?: Dinah’s Restaurant in Culver City—a total 1950s throwback with half-circle booths and a long counter with swivel chairs. Order anything from pancakes to their famous fried chicken, you can’t go wrong. It’s definitely our favorite, local weekend spot and one of the first places we ate at when we landed back in LA.
Can’t-live-without mom product: Sunblock, sunblock, sunblock. And not just for me, that goes for the whole family.
Favorite thing about raising kids in LA: I love the laid back pace coupled with big city benefits. We can hang out in our neighborhood and chill with our friends and neighbors at a block party or we can go see a first-class art and entertainment, all within a few minutes of our home. I also love how easy it is to hike around the beautiful mountains and have been introducing various hikes to the kids.
Most unique (or daring) thing you’ve ever done with your kids locally: Taking my son for a horseback ride through Will Rogers State Park. His horse was bigger than mine and watching him navigate and try and control such a large animal was both terrifying and inspiring at the same time.
Congrats to first-time mom and dad Emily Ratajkowski and husband Sebastian Bear-McClard! The model/actress recently announced the birth of a baby boy with a sweet mommy-son Instagram pic.
The model and actress went public with her growing baby bump last fall, with a series of IG posts and an essay in Vogue on why she doesn’t want to reveal the gender of her baby.
Ratajkowski wrote last October in Vogue, “the truth that we ultimately have no idea who—rather than what—is growing inside my belly. Who will this person be? What kind of person will we become parents to? How will they change our lives and who we are? This is a wondrous and terrifying concept, one that renders us both helpless and humbled.”
She went on to add, “I think about my husband and what a son would bring up for him. Is he secretly yearning for a boy? When I ask him, he refuses to give me an answer, swearing that he doesn’t have a preference. But one Sunday as he’s watching football he makes a remark about how it’d be fun to have a little boy to watch with.”
As it turns out, Ratajkowski and Bear-McClard did have a boy—and they named their son Sylvester Apollo Bear. The new mom got plenty of congratulations on IG, with celebs such as Kate Bosworth and Ashley Graham sending well wishes.
Grammy-nominated performer Elle King is pregnant! The singer and fiance Dan Tooker recently revealed their baby news on Instagram and in a PEOPLE exclusive.
The road to the couple’s soon-to-be baby joy hasn’t been easy. King, who has polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), struggled with infertility and pregnancy loss.
King opened up about her fertility issues and subsequent pregnancy losses in PEOPLE saying, “It’s such a major thing that so many people go through, but it’s so secretive—like you have to go through it alone.” The singer added, “Nobody talks about it. It’s like you’re supposed to feel shame; like you’re not supposed to tell people before 12 weeks, because if you lose it, it’s going to be embarrassing for you and you don’t want other people to get their hopes up.”
The couple found out about King’s pregnancy on Christmas, but only recently announced the news publicly. King started her IG announcement with, “Well, we did something! Me and @tattooker made a little human!”
She went on to add, “We are very excited to share the news that we are pregnant. This news comes with a great deal of fear, and I hope that all mothers-to-be, in whatever sense that may be, know that I am trying to be very sensitive. You see, this miracle baby comes after two very big losses. It’s a terrifying and extremely painful experience for everyone. But the sun always rises, and I never really let go to let the universe decide when I was ready. I remember every pregnancy announcement felt like a dagger to me. So I want to be very delicate and say to YOU! That soon to be mom, who’s maybe had a loss, or has been struggling with fertility, I’m telling you, our babies come. And I love you.”
King continued with a shout out to other women who have gone through similar struggles, “What women go through on this journey make us nothing less than WARRIORS. So thank you for your prayers and love for our high risk pregnancy!”
Congrats go out to King and Tooker on their beautiful baby news!
I’d like to start out by saying that giving birth was not what I expected. I expected a lot of screaming (by me) and a lot of nurses running around. What I got was the opposite. The staff was calm and surprisingly so was I and my fiance. I was in labor was six hours. The worst part? The contractions. Which I was also surprised by. I had invisioned pushing to be the worst part. Pushing was the easy part and actually was a relief! I did not notice the stitches that my doctor was doing or anything else for that matter once my baby was on my chest.
Boy was I exhausted but I was running on pure adrenaline. My body had just pushed out an actual human being! My fiance and I were in awe of the beauty of our little girl and the giving birth process. Once our little girl was here, the nurses asked if I wanted to breastfeed. I said yes and was shocked (still am) at how hard breastfeeding is! Everyone says it’s a natural process. In my only experience, ladies, I am sorry it is not. It is a lot of work! After the breastfeeding training, I was able to take a nap and enjoy my baby. Thankfully, we were able to leave the very next day and so excited.
We were home and totally excited! We were now a little family of three! What I didn’t know was that this was about to turn into the hardest month of my life. Once we got home, my body finally came to the reality of what it had done. I was exhausted, in pain, and wanting to feel like myself. I wanted to be a super mom! Instead, I felt weak and scared. The pain of using the bathroom was terrifying and intense. I cried every time. I would like to say I found relief but I never did. It took a whole month for my pain and blood to go away. My emotions were on a rollercoaster ride and I was exhausted at trying to understand myself and wanted a quick fix. Within a week, I realized that I was supermom and eventually I would return to being myself. I would be a stronger and better verion of myself.
During the first month after birth, you have to be patient with yourself. You are a superwoman who just did an amazing thing. For me, the hospital was easy, however, once we were outside the hospital, for a month was awful. Whether it is all awful or all awesome, it is so worth it! I cannot wait to do it all over again.
Hi! I'm Carolyn Erickson! I am from Wisconsin and mother of a beautiful baby girl. I'm a new stay at home mom and I am loving it. I also am beginning my career as a freelance writer and blogger!
Getting a holiday picture with Santa is a Christmas tradition, and while many families walk away with a picture-perfect shot, there are just as many who end up with a major Santa fail. Until they get older, tons of littles find the big man in red terrifying––and these photos prove it. From crying babies to getting Mrs. Claus in on the action, keep scrolling to see some hilarious Santa photo fails that’ll keep you laughing the entire holiday season.
Whether you’re heading out, or staying in for Halloween 2020, the citizens of New York City are still bringing it with over-the-top and amazing Halloween decorations. From gorgeous and festive to creepy or campy, we’ve rounded up some of our favorites—that of course, you can “tour” from the comfort of your living room. (Still looking for ideas on what to do for Halloween? Check out these!)
Creepy in Kensington
Enormous spider/candy chute? Check. Flying bat? Check. Timely headstones with puns? Check. Check it out on E. Fourth near Albemarle.
We appreciate the maximalist sensibility of this display in Greenpoint. #moreismore
Dominating in Ditmas
Mimi O'Connor
This massive display in Ditmas Park in Brooklyn gets more elaborate each year. Spiders, creepy clowns, zombies, witches, skeletons, demons: no matter your nightmare, there's something for you! (Find it at the corner of Argyle and Albemarle Road.
Not for the faint of heart, this Halloween house in Middle Village not only sports a highly-coveted larger-than-life skeleton, its creepy display continues. (Click through photos for more terrifying tableaus.)
After weeks at home, the days are starting to blur together. Abundant family time is beautiful and challenging. Can you relate?
I’m moving more slowly. No need to rush, no hurry. Life has become relatively simple. I’ve been doing plenty of rolling around on the floor with my 6-month-old. We listen to the birds, gaze at the trees, watch for butterflies. My mind wanders.
Part of me feels guilty. An inner voice admonishes, “Stop being lazy, you should be making progress, get back to doing (fill in the blank).”
“Shhh!” I respond to that nagging voice. “Be quiet, I’m daydreaming!”
I’ve learned from experience that this slowing down is valuable, it’s prime time for letting the dreams flow. This is where the magic happens. We have been gifted a mindfulness pause. We have an opportunity to go slower and explore our wild ideas; to visualize a new future. This unusual time may allow us to reconnect with our imaginations, individually and as families. Daydreamers aren’t limited by geographic restrictions, we can go anywhere!
“Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere,” said Einstein.
Our family business began as a daydream over a decade ago. Just prior to rolling up our sleeves and building our jungle lodge, we embarked on a two-month kayaking adventure on Baja’s Sea of Cortez. My father, brother, and I spent 8-to-10 hours a day paddling on a journey of nearly 1000 miles of wilderness. Though our arms moved rhythmically and our bodies were confined to the kayaks, our minds were free to roam.
We had an abundance of family time. As we paddled hundreds of miles of pristine coastline, I unleashed my daydreams, opened to vast possibilities. I lost myself in the peaceful dance of the water currents and ripples. With each mile of coastline, our eco-lodge dream morphed. “Questions and answers shot through my head like arrows. Some hit the target, others missed by a mile. Bull’s-eyes were collected and safeguarded in my mind.” My brother became my devil’s advocate; poking holes in my wild ideas, ultimately making our shared vision stronger.
With this abundance of time at home, why not open our minds and teach our kids the power of daydreams? So many children are told to get their heads out the clouds. Now is an ideal time to rewire that thinking.
Why is it that daydreamers have gotten a bad rap, while visionaries are celebrated? Visionaries like Yvon Chouinard (Patagonia founder) or Steve Jobs (Apple co-founder) were daydreamers long before they took action. Einstein was a classic daydreamer, yet consider all that he achieved! Daydreaming is an essential prerequisite to action.
Let’s take this opportunity to pause, surrender to our daydreams, and see where they take us—as parents and as children. May the family daydreams flow! Be realistic (we are all beholden to the laws of gravity), but don’t hold back.
As we unleash our daydreams, may we have the strength and courage to embrace inevitable change, transition, and whatever comes next. We will boldly reach for the next trapeze bar of life.
“Sometimes, I feel that my life is a series of trapeze swings. I’m either hanging on to a trapeze bar swinging along or, for a few moments, I’m hurdling across space between the trapeze bars. Each time I am afraid I will miss, that I will be crushed on unseen rocks in the bottomless basin between the bars. But I do it anyway. I must. It can be terrifying. It can also be enlightening. Hurtling through the void, we just may learn to fly.” — Danaan Parry
Known as “The Jungle Mama”, Tamara Jacobi is the author of Wildpreneurs:A Guide for Turning Passion into Business (HarperCollins Leadership, Feb. 2020) and founder of the Tailwind Jungle Lodge on the Mexican Pacific. Tamara is loving the adventure of motherhood! Her son Zephyr was born on Oct, 2019.
Over the course of the last few weeks, my four-year-old has developed a horrible new habit. He gets out of bed multiple times a night, begins screaming, “MAMA” at the top of his lungs, and moves into the bedroom, still screaming, until I sit up and have a conversation with him about why he is screaming for me.
I cannot tell a lie, it completely and totally sucks. There is nothing like being jarred from sleep by a four-year-old with a blood-curdling scream. The first time it happened, I was terrified. I thought he had fallen out of his bed and broken his leg or that something equally as terrifying had happened.
But no. That is and never has been the case.
All I have to do is ask him what’s wrong and he will calm down after about 30 seconds and say something along the lines of, “My big toe itches. Will you scratch it?” through snot and tears. So I scratch his toe or rub his back, or get him “this much” to drink.
As a person that truly loves sleep and needs at least eight hours a night to function, I have developed a habit where I lie in bed all night anticipating that blood-curdling scream. So needless to say, I have not been getting the best sleep lately.
This morning, I got a blood-curdling scream and thought about how much I miss the little things, like being able to sleep and having alone time.
Disclaimer: Yes, I love my children more than life itself. I would step in front of a train for them. But becoming a parent has taught me that some things are non-negotiable. So don’t comment that I’m a bad mom, Lisa, the internet troll.
Here are 11 things you must love —or learn to love—if you want to become a parent.
1. Being woken up in the middle of the night by a blood curdling scream or by its equally terrifying counterpart, the tiny person staring at you while you sleep.
2. Poop. Cleaning poop. Picking up poop. Finding poop in odd places. Teaching your kid to poop in the potty. Watching them poop in the backyard like the dog. That last one might just be me.
3. Never being alone. The minute you have kids, you will never have alone time again. They will always find you. You could hide in the crawl space under your house and a tiny little hand would find its way under a crack to ask what you’re doing.
4. Fart jokes. Maybe this is just because I’m a boy mom, but my kid is in the “fart, poop, laugh” phase and it’s killing me. Every sentence ends with the word poop, fart, toilet or underpants.
5. Bad knock-knock jokes. Henry just learned what knock-knock jokes are and I have said, “Poop who” at least 500 times in the last 5 days.
6. Crumbs. I don’t care what my kids are eating, they will somehow make a massive amount of crumbs from it. They could eat ice cream in a bowl and somehow develop crumbs. My advice is to get a dog to lick up the crumbs.
7. Someone completely defying societal norms. Having a kid is like one big sociology project. They will stand in the elevator facing the wrong way. They will tickle the back of a random person’s neck while at church. They will scream, “Is that a BUTT?” at someone in Target. And yes, Lisa, I have told my child we don’t say butt, but he has not complied.
8. Tantrums. Wrong color bowl for eggs? Lay on the ground screaming. Wrong superhero cartoon? More screaming. Ask if they had a good day at preschool? Screaming and crying. Taking them to a place they asked to go? Screaming and crying.
9. Doing things that gross you out. I rode a freaking camel at the zoo the other day. Enough said.
10. Teeny tiny toys. Damn the inventor of Tsum Tsums and Shopkins. I know they are tiny so you can sell more and pay less to make them, but I have spent so many hours on my hands and knees searching the backyard for a 3 cm sword that goes to a teeny tiny pirate.
11. Ryan’s Toy Review. So annoying. Props to Ryan for creating a virtual empire, but does he go to school? How does he find time to make all these videos?
So if you are about to have kids, or are thinking about trying, just remember that they are adorable little minions that smell like fresh baby powder for a few days, months or a year if you are lucky. But you will then learn that you won’t sleep until they are 18, your coffee will always be cold and they will repeat the bad words you say.
So don’t yell, “Use your blinker, you as*hole!” in a fit of rage on an Interstate somewhere.
I am a full time working mom with two little boys, Henry and Simon. I write about real life and real life gets messy. Contributor for Motherly, HuffPost Parents, Scary Mommy, Today Parents, Love What Matters and Her View From Home.