Halloween Crafts

The moment summer teases me with a slight breeze, my pumpkin patch, haunted house, and “it’s fall y’all” obsession begins. Yes, I’m a sucker for spooky and a fool for fall. I start planning for Halloween decorations in early August.

Because this is the first year in the new house, I have to modify many of my decorations to fit the new abode. After 10 years in one haunted house, I basically had the same decorations in the same place year after year, but continually added to them. I made a wreath and door swag to fit the doorway for the old house. Now that I have 2 doors, I have to turn my one wreath into 2 so that it will match the old swag. Here is how I create my easy peasy, but frightfully fabulous wreaths.

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For starters, you will need a wire wreath frame. They come in many sizes. Mine is 14 inches for an oversized look. Purchase them online, at craft stores or even the dollar tree. You also need deco mesh ribbon, several spools of Halloween wired ribbon, a pack of pipe cleaners and scissors. For my wreathes, I’m sticking to black, white, grey and purples. I tend to always use black and white for the basis of all my decorating and then add in one or two additional colors.

I can’t even count how many ways there are to use deco mesh ribbon for creating custom wreathes. Most people use the poof method. I can’t seem to get my loops and access even and they never turn out nicely. Instead I make my wreath entirely of ribbon tails. I start out cutting about 10-12 deco mesh strips that measure about 14 inches. Then I choose 2 spools of wired ribbon and cut 10-12 of each into 12 inch strips. I fold each ribbon in half and then cut an inward angle at each end. The wired edge will be the top and you will cut down toward the middle. When you unfold the ribbon it will have a V shape at the end which gives it a tail look.

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Lay all three ribbons on top of each other and secure each to the wreath form with a pipe cleaner. It’s better to attach the pipe cleaner to TWO of the wires on the wreath frame. If you only attach it to one, it won’t stay in place. After you get your 10 to 12 attached, you can see what ribbons you want to use to fill your wreath in. You will continue this process until it’s full! I used 36 groups of three on mine. I will probably add more next year. After Halloween, I grab up clearance items and I’m a sucker for ribbon.

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Next, it’s time to add embellishments. I added purple roses, black glitter bats and plastic skeletons from The Dollar Tree. The skeletons needed a quick make-over first. I spray painted them white. Then I made them little hats from used keurig cups, by spray painting them back, and adding a ribbon band and a feather. I gave them sequence eyes and bow ties. These skeletons went from creepy to festive in order to earn their place on my wreath.

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To get my friends into the Halloween mood, we hosted an outdoor craft night to create spooky wine bottle luminaries. After soaking clear wine bottles and removed the labels, I painted them using frosted glass spray paint. (Helpful hint: Use WD-40 to loosen really stubborn labels.) I printed and cut out clip art haunted houses, scary trees, ghosts, bats and moons in different sizes. I purchased FolkArt Enamel because it’s specifically made to use on glass. I also picked out several colors of thin ribbon in case anyone wanted to add a touch of color. My friend ordered a pack of wine bottle corks with attached mini fairy lights from Amazon. The mini LED lights are battery operated and add a magical touch to these luminaries. My daughter and I practiced on jelly jars to make sure I had thought of everything before the girls came over. Our little jars turned out as cute as can be.

Everyone chose the clip art shapes they wanted to use for their luminaries. I, for one, don’t have the small motor skills to paint well and I get nervous, so tracing for me is a must! First, we traced the shapes onto the bottle with pencil and then black sharpie. Then we got to work painting. We took our time chatting and snacking as we painted. The luminaries take a good two coats to really block out the glow of the fairy lights in the painted area. The enamel does dry pretty quickly, but we still needed to be careful. Once our luminaries were painted, we tied a few cute strands of ribbons to the neck of the bottle. It was a really great night and the bottles turned out really great.

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I hope you can find time to create something spooktacular this Halloween Season! Happy Haunting!