Getting Crafty for Halloween Quickly and Inexpensively

Here are a few simple ideas for you to try for your Halloween decor. A lot of these decorations are made using recycled materials. Paper towel rolls are a source of inspiration, and can be used for many projects. covered with tin foil, or wrapping paper make candles, dynamite sticks, as well as swords, or scabbards. The dynamite sticks are the easiest, the paper towel rolls could even be painted red, to simulate dynamite. A few paper streamers out of the top, or a black plastic straw, and there is the "fuse".

Make some ghosts - cut a few rectangles of white material, fold over in half, add a little scrap material to the center of the ghost, and add a rubber band to the top to make a head. If you like, place some wrapped sugar-free mints in the center of the ghost for a party favor.

If you have some used hacky-sacks lying around, these can easily be converted into "spiders", with the addition of some black or dark material (used jeans), and some yarn or a few pipe cleaners for the spider legs. A spider web can also be made with a few yards of dark organza, and glued yarn circles arranged into an octagonal shape, with spokes of glued yarn out from the center to the edge of the organza.

Make up a small graveyard by way of using cardboard boxes, this simple graveyard is something that will delightfully take aback visitors to your door. Use your imagination to create rectangular or semi-circular tombstones for your living room, entertainment room, or covered porch. These are especially good when you have mailing boxes, and lots of black and white poster paint, or, leftover grey paper, or construction paper, or even dollar store gray fabric to glue onto the cardboard. Gussy up these cardboard boxes tombstones with some cute slogans such as "I.M. Dead 1950 - 1984", "X.X. Centurion 1900 - 1999", or "Here lies Sammy Bligh, caught a bug and quickly died", to scare up a crowd, if you don't make them laugh this Halloween, at trick or treat time.

The dollar store towels and floor mats I made a few years ago that are now being made in factories. $1 per yard material, 54" x 36", will make 3 12" x 12" napkins, plus a 42" x 36" tablecloth, simply by using fusible binding, to create a hem. This 54" x 36" material will also create 2 18" x 24" hand towels, plus, a 30" x 36" coffee table cover. Many stores offer generous discounts on Halloween print material, also, that will allow for the purchase of some bright and decorative material that can be used for years of Halloween festivities.

It's easy to decorate pre-existing towels and napkins with decorative Halloween trim, for those of us with no need to get more hand towels, or other linens. A few rolls of fabric trim should be enough to create some lovely Halloween theme items. The floral wire trim, when twisted into a circle, makes for a simple, yet elegant, napkin ring.

Lunch bag hand puppets for the special day can be painted up with crayons, magic markers, or tempera paint. These crafts are quick, easy, and don't last very long, maybe a day or two, for the most part. Plastic bowls and buckets may also be decorated by older kids as well as by you with waterproof magic markers.

Sock hand puppets - if you have a collection of socks that are mismatches, this is the time to take out a few, and use them for something other than chalk sacks. Gluing little ears, noses, mouths and eyes made out of felt onto the puppets makes cute and interesting, sometimes, even frightening pets and monsters. This is the time of year when a fearsome pet with ten eyes, two noses, three ears and four mouths is perfectly acceptable. Four small pieces of felt should cost about one dollar, or less if you already have some hanging around the house.

Ghost sock hand puppets also work very well, especially if you seem to have a lot of white sock loners hanging around. Just cut halfway up each side of the sock to help create the "cloak effect", and make an inner layer of "cloak layers" using your ripped up white fabric, or some organza, or both. Finish up the ghosts with some shoelaces for the neckties.

Paper mache is made out of old newspapers and a flour/water paste, and most kids enjoy painting these objects, even if making them is gooey and messy, and takes too long. For us adults, making paper mache is generally easy, just rip a few sections of newspaper into 1" - 2" strips, and set aside in a plastic bag. Then, mix 1 cup of flour and 3 cups of water in a used half gallon plastic container, or dollar store plastic mixing bowl. Dip the strips into the paper, and then, wrap around a rock, a plastic Easter egg half, or something like an inflatable balloon. Paper mache needs to dry for a day or two, so, making up a few bases to be painted into Halloween's scary things is best done the night before. The "molds" for paper mache can even be inflated balloons. The circles and ovals can be painted into pumpkins, monster faces, and other innovative creations that your kids and their friends will think up, if you provide the paint colors, your attendees will develop their own ideas.

These are a few quick ideas for you, hope that your Halloween this year is better and has more crafty surprises than this short article might point out, can be yours by way of using some ordinary household items that you might otherwise throw away.