Spooky Spaghetti Halloween Sensory Bin

Last updated on October 23rd, 2023

Inside: This spooky spaghetti sensory play is sure to be a hit this Halloween with your kids! They will love squishing their fingers into dyed spaghetti and finding creepy critters.

Spooky Spaghetti Sensory Play

Mamas, this sensory bin is so much fun! It is easy to set up and provides endless entertainment for your kids. It’s time to get into the spooky spirit and get out all the creepy crawlies for this spaghetti sensory bin.

What You Need For Spooky Spaghetti Sensory Play

• A big box of spaghetti (we didn’t use quite the full box)
• water + pot + strainer for cooking spaghetti
• 3 one-gallon zip-lock bags
• food coloring
  • green, orange, blue/red (for purple/black)
• vinegar
• olive oil
• mini pumpkins and mini cauldrons
• tweezers
• kitchen tongs
• kitchen fork
• spooky Halloween stuff
• large rectangular short bin
• Kraft paper + tape or drop cloth or tarp (optional)
• art smock (optional)

How To Set Up For Spooky Spaghetti Sensory Play

I’ll admit, this set up looks a little overwhelming, but I promise you, it’s super easy! Really!

Boil your spaghetti in one pot until ~2 minutes before ‘done’ according to package directions. You want it a little less done so it isn’t super mushy and doesn’t break apart easily during play.

Run the spaghetti under cold water until nice and cool and easy to handle.

Separate your cooled spaghetti into 3 different one-gallon zip-lock bags. You don’t have to be perfect here – it’s okay if they aren’t evenly distributed.

Add in a ton of drops of food coloring and a splash of vinegar (this will help the color ‘stick’).

Close your zip-locks and shake and mix up to distribute the color evenly. Add more food coloring as needed.

Once you’ve evenly distributed your food coloring, add a small amount of olive oil to each zip-lock to prevent the spaghetti from sticking together as it dries.

Lay out your spaghetti in your rectangular clear bin. Add some spooky Halloween stuff on top, at random. Let it all dry for just a couple of minutes before playing.

Set up your workstation by covering your table or floor with protective paper or a tarp (optional). Put an art smock on your kids (optional).

How To Play With Spooky Spaghetti Sensory Bin

Set your spaghetti sensory bin on your child’s workstation and hand them a few tools: tongs, tweezers, and a fork. Demonstrate first, how to pick up the spaghetti with each tool and give them a few little tips on how to play.

They will mostly figure this out on their own – but you can help guide them at first by showing them or asking questions, such as, “can you pick up the green spaghetti with these tongs?”, etc.

My toddler started to lead in play by playing a little ‘hide and seek’ with the spooky critters. He would mix all the spaghetti around with tools and his hands and than search for the hidden spiders, fingers, and eyeballs throughout the mixture.

Once he located the spooky filler – he would use the tweezers, tongs, or his fingers to pick them up and would hoard them inside the mini pumpkins and cauldrons. He entertained himself with this game he created for at least an hour before I had to call it quits on this activity!

He was begging to play longer – which surprised me as far as a toddler’s attention span goes!

Identifying all the spooky critters and gadgets he found was half the fun. He kept cracking himself up saying ‘ooo a spooky spider!’ or ‘I found a finger!’. It was too cute watching him get excited for all the Halloween stuff!

I was a little worried about clean up – but after one good hand washing – the dye came right off. It didn’t stain our hands at all!

Let me know how your spaghetti sensory bin turned out by leaving a comment below.

If you’re looking for more fun Halloween stuff to do with your kids, check out these other ideas by clicking here.