Enthusiastic Halloween decorators know that although the expensive effects and props are wicked cool, the best way to spook the trick-or-treaters is by using old fashioned elbow grease.
Halloween Bargains
Your local dollar store is going to be your new best friend. There you will find everything from spider webs and bags of spiders to glow-in-the dark skeletons that can be hung like a garland with fishing line. Costumes are cheap at the dollar store and a scary mask can be stuffed and sitting on a table or hung from the ceiling. A simple with hat, purchased for $1, looks cool sitting on a table by itself. You can also find cool lawn stake Halloween decorations, rubber rats to stick in a corner of the bathroom for an unsuspecting guest, or small gravestones at the dollar store.
Halloween Candlelight
The most inexpensive way to decorate for Halloween is by candlelight. Buy a bag of 100 tea lights and be creative with containers for them around your house. Small hollowed-out gourds or pumpkins, small drinking glasses or vases, or simply a line of plain tea lights across a mantel can create an eerie effect for your friends. Arrange old broken twigs in a tall glass near the candles; they’ll create spooky shadows on the wall near your candles.
Make-Your-Own Creatures
Whether it is a witch, a scarecrow, a mummy or a scary zombie you’d like to create, it can usually be done with things you already have around the house. You can use a dollar store mask, a decorated pumpkin or a large Barbie hairstyling or mannequin head, cheap black fabric (grim reaper black robes are cheap at the dollar store), flannel shirts and jeans for a scarecrow, and tea-stained gauze for a mummy. (You could also make a noose out of heavy rope and "hang" a handmade "corpse" from it). Find an image online of what you’d like your creature to look like; this will help inspire you as you create your Halloween character.
Buy After Halloween
One of the best ways to save money on Halloween décor is to buy Halloween decorations the day after Halloween. Stores discount Halloween items up to 80%, and you can put the decorations away for next year. Also, if you have a specialty Halloween store nearby, they often have to move out after Halloween so will sell store props for little or nothing. It’s never too early to start planning for next year’s Halloween!
Halloween is really all about being creative, not spending money. Get inspiration from all the pricey catalogs, but recreate the concepts in a fun, inexpensive way. Spook on!
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