From years past hosting a haunted trail in the woods, to some epic parties in the back shed, if I'm gonna do Halloween up, I'm gonna do it up right.
Usually. But not this year.
Or for that matter not Halloween 2014, '15, or 2016 either.
Hard to believe the door things that you are about to see is the work of the same woman who made these awesome party invites......
Or whose party buffet spread sports glowing fake windows.....
Sure the old and young carve a few pumpkins every year, but there has been no mad scientist displays, no spooky yard decorations, and nothing on my porch to let passers-by know I've got a queen crown and 999,999 bins of Halloween stuff.
Then again, we live a quarter mile off of the road back in the woods, so no one is really just a "passerby". For all I know folks are thinking I'm a real witch and they warn their kids to never ever approach the crazy lady.
I'm only crazy spooky in October, I promise.
But there is a certain 7 and soon to be 10 year old, who have no idea about the bins and bins of Halloween stuff or the queen crown, and they would have been too young to know about the Sure-wood Forest (sure would like to get outta here) or how their daddy and his friends were able to look like fake scarecrows eliciting screams of terror from folks we call our friends.
So yesterday I stopped in at the dollar store.
I didn't need any more spider webs. I didn't need anything since I could probably recreate a movie set with the stuff in my bins, but there in lies the issue.......
Who the helll wants to dig out all those bins just to find a few spider webs and a couple things to hang on the doors?
Not me and I was guessing not Brawn.
It would take half the afternoon by the time the bins were hauled out, then find what I am looking for, haul them back to sit in the way till I open them back up on November 1st to put back inside whatever I took out, and once again put them in their final resting spot.
Much easier to spend $8 bucks between Goodwill and Dollar Tree.
And that's what I did, all so that certain soon to be 10 year old and his 7 year old sister wouldn't think I was the Halloween grinch.
My friend and fellow Minnesotan Linda from Itsy Bits and Pieces made herself a spider wreath that I thought I could duplicate.
I know how to run a glue gun so I set out to snag some dollar store spiders and a round foam wreath form.
Negatory.
Neither to be had at our dollar store, everyone must want to make a wreath like Linda's right about now.
After I filled my cart with dollar crap, which was still easier than carrying bins out of storage, I went next door to the Goodwill just to see what they might have.
They had one bag of the elusive plastic spiders, for $1.99, which ended up costing me $17 dollars as apparently now I collect white soup tureens.
I spent $6 bucks on some mismatched junk that I thought I could spook up just a enough to at least flavor the two entrances, plus the $2 on the Goodwill Spiders for a total of $8.00. Or $17.00 if you count the tureens, but I'm not counting them. What tureens?
Door #1.....
A cheesy glittery spider web shape with a white spider. Not scary.
Some black creepy fabric, for a buck (duh!) that I liked.
1 bag of un-needed spider web that comes with 4 spider rings. I don't get why there were rings, I don't recall my other 25 bags of spider webs hiding in bins having rings.
A set of two big hairy tarantulas, creepy yes.
Throw those things together and you have an ugly but creepy looking door hanging thing.
You might decide to take off the fake fall leaves, but I didn't feel like finding another place for that so stuck it back on.
Yeah I know it falls very short of the spider wreath I wanted to make, but if ugly is spooky then I win a prize, and I never claimed to be real creative when I'm being lazy.
While dinner was cooking, I sat down with the glue gun and annoyed my husband as he tried to do paperwork.
I don't think he was impressed with my glue gun skills, but he was very agreeable to the idea he didn't have to help carry bins. Well worth $8 dollars to him not to have to do that.
$17.00 if you count the two soup tureens and two orange bowls. Yeah, I got two bowls as well that I didn't need at Goodwill.
Door #2
One Styrofoam tombstone
220 of the 250 little spiders, along with a big white glittery gummy style spider who was in the package and I guess birthed all those little ones. Nothing says scary like glitter.
More of the spider web and the black fabric
A piece of burlap I dug out of the closet to make a sad looking bow.
A bow on a tombstone, lame, but it looked odd without something on the top and being creative was pretty much at an all time low.
I figured what the helll, the glittery spider wasn't gonna scare anyone so why not add a bow on top.
The sixth dollar bill that was spent at the store was for a window cling that I put on a mirror along with yet more web from that same bag.
To recap - for the $8 dollars I spent I added something to the front door, the mudroom door and a mirror, and I still have plenty of web left if I want to stretch that somewhere too - maybe over the two white soup tureens so Brawn thinks they've been there a while.
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You ARE the Halloween queen, Bliss! Such great ideas...I love the window cling mirror idea and that tombstone spider door!! Thanks for the shout out, my friend...but I didn't make that wreath...Oriental Trading...about ten bucks right now!
ReplyDeleteso glad you wont be as 'grinchish' on halloween. is that even a word? clever as always.
ReplyDeleteAwesome ideas!
ReplyDeleteI remember those days with all the spooky stuff! Forever preserved on the blog, so you can just show that 10 and 7 year old the photos! Ha! But love that you added some spook (and creepy) spiders to the doors and mudroom. Let us know how those tureens are working out. Perhaps you can fill them with the candy you hand out to the sprinkling of trick-or-treaters who stop by to see the queen of Halloween! Oh, and nice to see you in my inbox! :) Linda
ReplyDeleteTombstone is cool. I'm not a Halloween person at all but you're too COOL that if I lived near you I would suck it up.
ReplyDeleteI agree dragging things out when you are busy is the last thing we want to do. Our porch is done for fall and that's it this year. Too much going on
By the way, like the mirror idea.
Cindy
Yay! They still had window clings left!
ReplyDeleteWhy do I keep feeling like there might be a spider crawling on me now?
ReplyDeleteI love how when you 'take Halloween off' you still do more than just put out a pumpkin. You ARE the Queen of Halloween. $8 very well spent. Or even $17. xo
ReplyDelete