My house is often the spookiest on the street. And I’m talkin’, in July, due to lackadaisical housekeeping and lazy manscaping. However, things get REALLY scary at Halloween when we strive to legitimately secure the title of “Scariest House in the Hood.”
Here are five things we scare up to really spookify the joint:
1. Music: Borrow a Halloween music CD from the library and copy onto your computer. Play outside on a cd player. Make a slide show with Halloween inspired images to go along with the music and play the montage for trick-or-treaters. It’s a nice effect that doesn’t cost a thing. Plus, you only have to make it once and can re-use it year after year or at your Halloween party.
2. Lighting: Apart from glowing candle lit jack-o-lanterns, we switch up our door way and entrance hall lights from the everyday bulb to black lights or a red bulb. So easy, yet eerily effective.
3. Window Silhouettes: I caved a few years ago and bought the Martha Stewart window silhouettes; cling on bats, a cat, a spooky tree. They are displayed in our second floor windows, facing the street. I love them. If put away carefully, they can be used year after year.
4. Haunted Garage: With just a few blankets, sheets or black plastic sheeting, you can transform your garage into a spooky maze. There are all sorts of places online to find blueprints and instructions for how to do this. The easiest way we’ve found is:
Raise your garage door about ¾ of the way up. Suspend sheeting right down the centre of your garage, dividing it equally in half. Trick-or-treaters enter via a cardboard tunnel they must crawl thru. Fill with rubber snakes, spider webbing etc. Upon exiting the tunnel they continue on foot thru the dimly lit garage and out the other side. Decorate with hanging bats, webbing, eerie music, motion activated creatures (bought at the end of the season on sale the year before!), glow in the dark paint, a glowing cauldron, etc. Kids pick up their Halloween candy at the exit.
5. Live Action: For the past two years, I’ve taken the kids trick-or-treating while my husband, dressed as a scarecrow, sat in a rocking chair on our front porch holding the candy bowl. As unsuspecting (older) treat seekers approached, he would suddenly “come alive” and scare the beejesus out of them. Our neighbours have a similar “live action” scheme going on every year. They have a giant cardbox on their driveway. As kids come approach the house, the box bursts open and my skeleton clad neighbour jumps out. Not gonna lie, the first time he did it, it scared me to death.
Halloween is not for the faint of heart...
To read more spooky ideas, check out this spooky article over at Today’s Parent online.
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