Halloween Decorations

[dani_cat]

I'm trying to think of some creative ways to decorate for Halloween by not spending a whole lot of money and just using things in the house or outside.
Also I want to be creative and make my own costume. But nothing is coming to mind.
If anybody has any ideas please share and pictures are welcome.

[whisper]

You can make tombstones for the front of your house out of cardboard. If you want them to have a rough texture you can cover them with paper mache tinted gray.

Also stuffed clothes with a pillow case for a head makes a scarecrow. If you have a feed or hay store near you, they sometimes let you take the loose hay and you can use it for the scarecrow.

[Jinga]

As a kid, I loved making little ghosts out of paper towels or napkins. Just roll up a little wad of paper into a ball, cover it will an unfolded napkin or towel and tie a ribbon arounf the neck. You can hang them around the house. If you have a white plastic on hand, like a white garbage bag, they make great decoration to hang in small trees out in the yard. They float in the breeze :) If you want to add a face, use a permanent Sharpie type marker.

They end up looking something like this: http://www.michelesartroom.com/Craft%2022.jpg

My favorite variation of these ghosts got their round head shape from a lolipop ... they just tended not to last very long.

[WonderRandy]

every year, after halloween, I buy up as much Halloween Clearance stuff I can find - especially masks. Stuff some clothes with newspaper, add a mask and a hat = instant body/monster.

[karenlovessnow]

I can send you some of the spiders that I've been trapping/releasing over the last few weeks...Can't get much more realistic than that! :D

[LadyFaile]

one year i wanted to decorate and dress up to give out the candy but my hubby (boyfriend at the time) isn't into halloween and wanted to watch tv. well the front door opened into the livingroom so that'd kinda spoil the effect to have the lights and tv on. so i took a couple of black garbage bags and cut them into strips leaving them attached by about a 2 inch piece along the top and taped them around the entrance cutting it off from the rest of the house. it looked pretty creepy actually. then took a little 2-tiered end table and put a garbage bag over like a table cloth. on one tier i had my candy bowl, on the other i had some black candles and candle holders. i dressed all in black and borrowed a friend's witch hat. the little kids were a bit scared to come to the door, it was great. the older ones were complimenting me and saying how cool my house was etc. oh i also used cotton balls spread out thinly over the brick outside the door like spiderwebs. i've always used cottonballs for this, it works better than the spiderwebs you can buy for decorating cause they spread out more thin and random so it looks more like real cobwebs

[Starblossom]

for a costume you could look in your closet and see what you have to work with. i have a long black dress already, so i'll likely just get a witch hat and black makeup and be a witch. or buy a cheap halo, spraypaint black and be a dark angel. or i might wear black shirt/skirt and wear some "cat" accessories and makeup. One year, a friend of mine sewed her own costume that was basically a pretty dress that had a "fairy" type of look to it, and she dressed up as an autumn fairy.

if you have any flowery dresses or shirts (i don't know if you're a dude or not) you could wear that and make or buy a little crown and a lai and be a hawai princess or king

[dani_cat]

Cool, thankyou for your ideas.

[ICDeadPeople]

Hey if you like ghost here is a simple fast and fun way to create ghost. Makes about 15 ghost. First buy a helium tank from wal-mart-$20.00 white balloons-$1.00 at Dollar Tree.
Fishing Line and something to weight down the balloons. Now blow up as mamy balloons as you want ghost with the helium. Tie fishing line to the balloons the length you want them to float high. Tie the the other end to the weight. Now put pillow cases over the balloons or sheets or white material. Put faces on them as you like. WOW instant GHOST.
Sandy

[cryptoveggie]

I'm trying to think of some creative ways to decorate for Halloween by not spending a whole lot of money and just using things in the house or outside.
Also I want to be creative and make my own costume. But nothing is coming to mind.
If anybody has any ideas please share and pictures are welcome.

I don't have any pictures but the simplest, most effective thing I ever did for handing out candy cost absolutely nothing. I put the candy in a plastic bowl, taped a "please take one" note to the front, then wrapped up in an old sheet and pretended to be a mannequin holding the bowl in my lap. It always freaked the little darlings out when they came up to grab as much as they could carry and were admonished to read the sign. Silently covering the bowl when they reached for it also was very effective.

That, a few paper ghosts, and a few pie pumpkins could really make for a nice atmosphere for handing out candy. You can justify the cost of the pumpkins by eating them afterwards.

[Nickle00]

Dum dum ghosts!!

[Floating]

Ok, this may be dorky and a little bit out there... but...

If you have an unhealthy obsession with zombies like myself.. AND.. if you have a lot of friends who are willing to join you, then you can do what I did a few years ago.

Host an outdoor zombie party!

You and your friends are the decorations!
You can lay down on your lawn, sit around feasting on someone's brains..
I was laying on the street half under a car when I did it.

Then you get to start talking to all the people that walk past trick or treating! ^_^

To make the zombie costumes, you just need things like dirt and old clothes. Food works great to make blood and organs and stuff. I used a spagetti squash as fake 'squashed' hand that was run over by the car I was laying under.

You don't really need much other decorations other than that, maybe some police tape or something (some people have it laying around in their house. I don't know why O.o)

Anyway, I know it's an 'out there' suggestion, but I thought I'd share. ^_^


-Floating

[curses]

Floating that's an absolutely AWESOME idea. I wish we had more kids in our neighborhood that went trick or treating.

[WonderRandy]

I'm organizing a Zombie March on Halloween.... :D

[codemonkey]

You can make ghosts out of cheesecloth and starch. I saw it in a martha stewart magazine. You soak the cheesecloth in the starch and then drape it over something to make it into ghost shape and then let it dry like that. Once it's dry, you can take it off of whatever it was draped over and it will hold it's shape.

I haven't actually tried it but I think I'm going to this year.

[curses]

Not sure if you've got sweetgum trees where you live or not, but you can make spiders out of the sweetgum balls, some black pipecleaner and some googly eyes. just stick the pipecleaners in the holes on the balls and...instant spider!

[dani_cat]

No I don't, but thanks anyway.

[dani_cat]

The zombie party is a great idea but I just moved to a new area and don't know alot of people.