Within recent years Halloween has become one of the most celebrated holidays. And why not? It's fun for little and big kids alike. It's also how I got my inauspicious start in theme party planning.
With each passing year, our Halloween party took on a life of its own, growing bigger and more complex each year.
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Hubby and I would spend about 2 months decorating our front yard alone. Guests would take about 30 minutes to get from the yard to our front door because they were scoping out the yard decorations!
We wanted them in the Halloween party mood before they even got into the house.
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Tip: A great Halloween decorated yard assaults the 5 senses - sights, sounds, smells. Include elements that have motion to them and plenty of lighting.
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We became proficient DIY'ers in the process, eventually even building our own animatronics.
Invitations
These were some of my favorite Halloween invitations I ever made.
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It was a scrapbooked folded card with the party information on the inside.
Staging & Props
A great place to get Halloween decoration ideas are the Halloween suppliers conventions like this one:
No, you don't have to take out a second mortgage on the house to stage a great yard and house.
I made it my policy to buy only one higher ticket decoration per year. The rest I got from dollar stores, thrift stores and garage sales and repurposed them. We built the majority of our animatronics ourselves.
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Once I had an idea of what I wanted to stage as far as outdoor decorations, I'd lay all of the planned displays out on graph paper, paying particular attention to the displays that would require electricity. These were placed closest to my outdoor outlets. Hubby was an electrician so he went through all of the displays and how much electricity they would require so we didn't overload our electrical system.
We didn't want a Clark Griswold Christmas light situation on our hands.
You don't either...nothing will put a damper on a party faster than your house burning down. Take the time to check how much electricity you decor will need vs, what your electrical system can handle.
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And you'll save yourself a heap of time and frustration laying out everything beforehand.
Keep in mind when doing your Halloween decor that you don't want to traumatize little kids with it. It can be spooky while not being gory. And don't forget to add the unexpected and whimsical.
The first year I started out, I decided what displays I wanted to feature, then made a list of everything I'd need to make those displays. I found a whole lot at the dollar stores, on the cheap.
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I found many more at garage and rummage sales and secondhand shops and repurposed them to fit my displays.
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I watched a whole lot of DIY videos.
We mastered the easier DIY projects first, then graduated to making our own animatronics.
There are a couple things you'll want to invest in if you want to do over-the-top Halloween decor.
The first is a holographic projector. Under $50 and you can use it for different holidays.
The images project onto
your windows and really add to your staging.
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The other thing you might want to consider investing in (again about $50) is a fog machine.
Spot and strobe lights also add to the affect of your spooky yard decorations. And don't forget the music or sound effects!
Don't forget to include the whimsical in your decorations!
Doing your indoor staging isn't that different from doing your outdoor staging. In fact, I found staging the interior of the house easier than the outdoor decorations. Pay attention to the little details that get people's attention. You don't have to litter your house with Halloween decorations (unless that's your thing). You only need to create an ambiance - like the photo below.
A table with a few decorations set next to a staircase festooned with mice sets an ambiance. It's that ambiance you're after.
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Of course, if you want to go all out like I did, you can do that too! Your decor hinges more on innovation and creation than it does your budget.
When staging I usually start with my focal wall first. Backdrops are an easy, inexpensive way to fill large wall spaces.
In deciding what to stage I consider the room I'm staging. What staging does it lend itself to easily? i don't want to have to tear my house apart and being moving furniture for days just to stage a party.
For example, the longest of my living room walls contain bookcases so what would be easy to stage? How about a haunted library?
I then carry that same haunted library theme all the way through the entire space to my dining area.
I use backdrops a lot because they're inexpensive and cover a large area. They're easy to hang and also create the illusion of your space being larger than it is.
My theme is haunted library so on my second living room wall I'd hang a haunted library backdrop.
I work my way around the walls first, then begin to fill in with props.
These sources are good for inexpensive props:
Temu
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You can put any spin on your Halloween party: Hocus Pocus witchy party, Grim Reaper, Transylvania morgue, Glam, Zombie Apocalyspe...
I carried the haunted library theme through to my dining room with this backdrop behind my dining table.
I strung a string of mini white Christmas lights in front of it. On the other wall, I brought up an old black storage shelf I had in my basement to use as a bookcase and loaded it with old hardcover books I'd gotten from the local library for free as they were cleaning house to make room for new books.
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On to the centerpiece for the table...
My centerpiece cost nothing to make.
I simply roughed up the old hardcover books to age the look of the pages, I smudged them with scrapbooking distress ink, then brushed over that with Ranger Ink to give them an old metallic look. I painted the title on the book using craft paint.
I had the faux spider webs in my Halloween supply stash but you can buy them for a buck at any dollar store. Same with the spiders.
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I got a lot of remarks from my guests on how REAL my skull looked. Maybe that's because it was real! It was from my dad's med school dissection labs.
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Of course, I didn't reveal Frank's skull was real until AFTER my guests had eaten. LOL
I had a silver candelabra I'd received as a wedding gift so filled that with white DIY blood dripped candles. To do this, simply melt a red candle and let the red wax drip down the white candles.
For party favors I found these cute Trick or Treat bags at at Temu, 20 bags for $5.67 and filled them with small candy treats.
Food/Menu
I love the idea of serve-yourself charcuterie boards as they're so easy to make and all you have to do during your party is keep them stocked up with edible goodies.
Here are some more scrumptious Halloween treats...
Activities
Consider taking your guests to an area haunted house.
Or visit a pumpkin farm with a corn maze and hayrides.
Let your guests pick out a pumpkin and have a pumpkin carving contest as one of your party activities. Kids especially love pumpkin farms and everything they have to offer.
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Many cities have their own Halloween parties and costume judging contest for kids. Come one of their parties with your own.
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One year my (adult) neighbors and I dressed up and went Trick or Treating with shot glasses. Our friends got a hoot out of it because not a one of them recognized us!
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Remember this game from the Christmas party?
Simply adapt the same game to Halloween and put a bit of a new twist on it.
This time you'd need 12 Halloween pumpkin buckets, 6 orange balloons and 6 black balloons, something to pop the balloons with,
a foam dice and prizes in each bucket.
On the balloons, paint the number of dots on the dice on each of the balloons. You'd have an orange 2 and a black 2 dots for example to correspond to number 2 on the dice.
So if a guest rolled a 2, they'd choose either the black or orange pumpkin with the 2 dots on them.
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Both kids and adults love this game. You can get prize ideas from the video.
HALLOWEEN FEEL BOX
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I had the kids play this one at the first Halloween party we threw. They were so grossed out! LOL Until they discovered what they'd actually been feeling - grapes that were eyeballs, cooked spaghetti that were worms,
cooked rice that were maggots...you get the idea.
All you need is a box or number of bowls to put your items in and a blindfold.
Photo credit: The Spruce
We awarded a nice prize to the child who correctly guessed what most of the items really were they were feeling. Surprisingly, most kids had no idea what the items actually were that they were feeling! It's tougher than it looks!
Photo credit: The Spruce
PUMPKIN PATCH HUNT
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This is a fun Halloween game idea for kids and adults alike that will have you hunting from floor to ceiling to be the one who finds the most hidden pumpkins.
You can use little fake pumpkins or you could hide paper pumpkins to make this a more frugal and weather-friendly game.
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We hid little prizes in the pumpkins for the kids, including a $50 bill in one of them.
You never saw kids move so fast trying to find that one $50 pumpkin!
HALLOWEEN MEMORY GAME
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Test the memories of your guests in this fun Halloween party game.
You get to create the cards with this free online memory card generator. There are 16 unique cards, and they include a jack o' lantern, Frankenstein, ghost, bat, spider, haunted house, and more.
Photo credit: ArtMarie / Getty Images
SPOOKY WALK
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This Halloween party game's twist on musical chairs eliminates all the pushing and running. When the music stops, the kids rush to Halloween images you've placed on the floor. Pull an image from a hat—the child standing on that image is out of the game.
Photo credit: Sabine Duerichen / LOOK-foto / Getty Images
WITCHES STEW
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This is a great Halloween party game for kids that challenges them to pick up Halloween pictures as quickly as possible—using only a straw. You'll be surprised how much the kids will like this game, and it takes no time for you to set it up.
Photo credit: Adél Békefi / Getty Images
Photo credit: Rebecca Nelson / Getty Images
HALLOWEEN FILM FESTIVAL GAME
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This game lets the creative juices flow when your guests recreate Halloween classic movies or TV shows. You can make this as involved as you like, or keep it simple by letting guests act with a few simple prompts.
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You can do this same activity as a kind of Name That Tune, using audio clips of different monster songs, guests naming that monster tune. For example: Theme from the Munsters, Addams Family, Michael Jackson's Thriller etc.