Halloween Decorating at the Last Minute

There are a lot of Halloween crafts that your young goblins and witches can make out of materials that you probably have around your home or can be bought cheaply at the local drugstore. These are inexpensive and fun Halloween creations and decorations that are fun to make.

Halloween Tablecloth

Use a plastic or paper tablecloth that you buy for birthday parties. Use a white or an orange tablecloth. Lay it down on the table, and let the kids color with crayons or non-toxic markers. You can first trace Halloween shapes on to the tablecloth using cutouts and a pencil. Let the kids color in the designs. You can, as an additional option, sprinkle confetti in Halloween colors of orange and black over the tablecloth. Then lay down a clear plastic tablecloth over the top.

Halloween Wreaths

You have a couple of options for making wreaths. Buy a wreath at a craft store that is undecorated. Create and cut a wreath out of cardboard. Or use a large sturdy paper plate as a wreath.

Use materials such as cotton, spider web material sold everywhere at Halloween time, orange and black streamers, and plastic spiders and other spooky creatures.

Decorate the Halloween wreath with the materials using glue and ribbon and tape. Wreath designs are only limited by your little one's imaginations!

Homemade Trick Or Treat Bags

Use brown paper bags from the market, and glue on or paint on a spooky ghost, a jolly pumpkin or a scary bat. These are fun to decorate and can hold a lot more candy than bags you buy at the store!

The Spooky Hand

A quick and fun decoration/party treat to make using clear plastic gloves. Just place a red candy of some kind (jelly bean, candy corn, hot tamale, etc.) in the tip of each finger of the plastic glove, so it looks like a fingertip/nail. Then fill the glove with popcorn. Tie the glove at the wrist using yarn, sting, or ribbon in Halloween colors.

The Plastic Bag Ghost

Use the plastic bags you get at the grocery stores for this project. Cut with scissors 2 inch or so strips all around the bag. Do not cut all the way through to the end of the bag, leave about an inch and a half or so at the bottom of the bag. Take a lid from a butter container, or a plastic container of some kind, and attach the seam end of the shredded plastic bag to the inside bottom half of the rim of the lid using glue. Take a second plastic bag and cut strips again. Glue that shredded bag to the bottom half of the rim of the lid. You can poke a hole through the lid, and tie a sting through, and let the kids pull their "ghost" behind them as they run. Or just hang the "ghosts" around the house as decorations.

Cereal Box Gravestone

Very easy but fun! Just cover a cereal box with gray construction paper. Crayons, paint, non-toxic markers can be used to decorate the headstones with creative imaginations. When you place the gravestones outside in the yard, first drop in some small rocks to help the headstones stay put.

Little pumpkin head place settings.

If you are having a Halloween party, you can make these cute little place settings for all the kids. Buy some small Styrofoam balls at a craft store. Use orange gift tissue to cover the balls. Use green construction paper, or green cloth, to cut a stem and leaves. Glue these to the "pumpkins", and add a small tag with child's name. You can also shape the tissue around crumpled newspaper in the shape of a ball, instead of buying styrofoam balls.

Last minute Simple and Easy Costume Idea

Take a large brown paper grocery bag and cut it down the seam. Make two holes on the sides for arms. On the front side of the bag, draw a big red oblong shaped circle. Add a black line down the middle, and some black spots. Make some antennae with pipe cleaners, or construction paper, if you want. Add some warm black tights and a long sleeved black top, and you will have the cutest ladybug on the block! Try similar ideas like a robot for a boy. When you need a quick easy inexpensive costume, these will do the trick!

Party Craft Idea

Give children a piece of black construction paper, glue, and a bowlful of different shaped pastas. They can draw an outline of a skeleton first, if they want, or just glue on the pasta and create their scariest skeleton any way they want.