Snacks
Due to time constraints, food crafting took a bit of a backseat once again this year. We had pizza and soda as the main party foods. However, we did get around to making some spooky cupcakes this year.
For these bloody cupcakes, we used Funfetti cupcake mix. Brian made his classic vanilla icing (scroll to the bottom of this post for the recipe). For the fake blood, I took sea salted caramel sauce and added red food coloring. I then used a spoon to drizzle it over the cupcakes.
If you're looking to plan a Halloween party, but are in a bit of a time crunch, I would definitely recommend making bloody cupcakes. They look spooky, but take very little time to make. If you're really in a pinch, you could pick up premade cupcakes and add some caramel sauce fake blood to them. For other Halloween food and drink ideas, check out this post.
Outdoor Decor
While the outdoor setup was largely the same as last year, I did have a couple additional elements of the setup. Above you can see a picture of the front door, which, if you've seen last year's post, should look pretty familiar. Here's how I made the Wayton Manor sign. The doorbell, which is hanging up on the door, came from Target. It looks like Target no longer has the exact same doorbell, but they do have a similar one.
Next up we have the cemetery. Five of the stones I made. You can find the tutorials here, here, here, and here. You can't really see it well in this picture, but I placed my eerie bouquet in front of Emma Lewis's stone. My cemetery angel is also hanging out in the back of the cemetery against our maple tree's pot. The fencing, a couple of the stones, and some of the bones came from a cemetery kit I got from Target a few years back.
My "Beware of Werewolf" setup made a return again this year.
Now for the new stuff. While I unfortunately was unable to keep the larger pieces of my Alice in Halloweenland setup from last year (shown in last year's party post, although you'll have to scroll a little to find it), I did hold onto the skel-a-mingos as well as the clay mushrooms. I decided to add in my zombie garden gnomes for the start of a haunted garden setup. This was thrown together last minute, so given that, I think it worked out fine. I would like to expand on this next year, if I have the time.
Lastly for the outdoor decor, I gave the haunted artifact prop its own space. I found a handful of the broken pottery shards and plopped them down in front of the sign. This one isn't one of my favorite setups, but it is a good way to reuse a broken plant pot.
Indoor Decor
This is what the overall indoor layout looked like. A lot of the pieces are the same as last year, although the layout was a bit different. We rotated the couch to open up the space a bit.
Here's the wall of lenticulars plus my haunted mirror.
And here's some of my Stephen King DVD art, along with a false window I made that I haven't written about yet on this blog.
There's the couch, which I covered in creepy cloth again. You can find out how to make the eyeball throw pillow in this post, and the zombie pin up girl throw pillows in this post.
Here's my potions shelf. I have tutorials for most of the items on this shelf, including my creepy rag doll, my Pet Sematary inspired potion bottles, the "monster blood" (which did not fare as well as I had hoped it would in storage), the spell book on the lowest shelf (you have to dig through this post a bit to find the instructions), my gingerbread zombie, our Halloween 2017 "best couples costume" trophy, various potion bottles, the nebula in a bottle (which actually fares pretty well in storage. I just have to add water each Halloween), my spooky faced candle, our Halloween 2016 "best couples costume" trophy, the alien parasite, and our Halloween 2018 "best couples costume" trophy.
The last major indoor setup was the creepy doll shelf. You can find how to make the dolls in this post. Brian knocked over the middle doll last year and broke her, but luckily that only adds to the creepiness of the setup.
I also decorated the bathroom as room 217 in The Shining again this year, although I forgot to take pictures. If you haven't already, you can check out last year's Halloween party post to get an idea of what it looked like.
I'm excited to present to you my enchanted porcelain wind up doll Halloween costume. I'll be posting tutorials for the wind up key as well as the toy box prop soon. I curled my hair by setting it in pin curls over night, which is a great no heat curling mechanism. While there are contemporary styling products that will help your pin curls retain their shape, I just pinned my wet hair in curls and slept like that over night. Since I didn't use any styling products, my curls would have lost some of their shape with brushing, so I opted to brush my hair before curling and then to not brush it out the following day. This left my curls a little frizzy, but I figured that since I was going for a possessed doll look, that didn't hurt.
To make the cracks on my forehead and jawline, I used a plain black e.l.f. eyeliner pencil. I had tested drawing the cracks with liquid liner previously, but I had better control with the pencil, so that's ultimately what I chose. However, the pencil I went with was not waterproof, so by the end of the party, some of the cracks were looking pretty smeared. I'll probably be trying this look again on Halloween day, so if anyone has any waterproof vegan eyeliner recommendations, let me know!
People showed up wearing a number of clever costumes, so the competition for our costume contest was pretty stiff. The top row, from left to right is Sarah as a ninja, mom as a unicorn, Brian's mom, dad as a hunter, me as an enchanted porcelain doll, Brian as a dark sorcerer who enchanted me, and Adam. The bottom row, from left to right is James as a mummy, Katie as Bunnicula, and Jacob.
James won "best costume" with his handmade mummy costume.
Katie won "most creative costume."
Brian and I won "best couples costume."
Halloween Trophies
My cat trophies tend to be pretty popular, so I decided to go with them again this year. It's always fun, if a bit challenging, choosing what costumes to give the cats. For the couples costume, I opted for zombies. I painted the cats green and then added a couple of coats of glow in the dark paint. I then painted their eyes red. I mixed together red and black paint (maybe a little brown as well; I can't remember now) to make a blood color and painted their paws and faces with this "blood." I used a pickle jar lid to create the base. I painted it black and then glued on the cats. I printed a trophy label and glued that onto the edge of the jar lid.
For the best costume trophy, I went with Pennywise. I glued the cat figurine to the olive jar lid and then painted the lid and the cat black. I made a ruffle collar by folding strips of off white paper accordion style and gluing them together. I then glued the collar around the cat's neck. I painted the eyes red. I used the same crimson paint that I used for the zombies to paint on a nose and makeup. Once the trophy was dry, I glued on a label.
For the "most creative" costume, I went with the Cat in the Hat. I glued the cat figurine to the olive jar lid and painted the lid and the cat black. I then painted the cat's eyes red. To make the hat, I cut out a circle from red cardstock and punched a hole in the center. This created the brim of the hat. I then cut out a strip of red cardstock and rolled it into a cylinder with the same diameter as the hole punch circle. I glued the cylinder to the brim and glued the circle I had punched from red cardstock to the top. I then cut off strips of white cardstock and glued them around the hat. I glued on a label to finish the trophy.
I hope you've enjoyed a peek at my Halloween party. For more inspiration, including alternate snacks as well as some activities, check out my 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, and 2014 party posts, as well as my X-Files, Goosebumps, and The Shining themed birthday party posts.
Here's the wall of lenticulars plus my haunted mirror.
And here's some of my Stephen King DVD art, along with a false window I made that I haven't written about yet on this blog.
There's the couch, which I covered in creepy cloth again. You can find out how to make the eyeball throw pillow in this post, and the zombie pin up girl throw pillows in this post.
Here's my potions shelf. I have tutorials for most of the items on this shelf, including my creepy rag doll, my Pet Sematary inspired potion bottles, the "monster blood" (which did not fare as well as I had hoped it would in storage), the spell book on the lowest shelf (you have to dig through this post a bit to find the instructions), my gingerbread zombie, our Halloween 2017 "best couples costume" trophy, various potion bottles, the nebula in a bottle (which actually fares pretty well in storage. I just have to add water each Halloween), my spooky faced candle, our Halloween 2016 "best couples costume" trophy, the alien parasite, and our Halloween 2018 "best couples costume" trophy.
The last major indoor setup was the creepy doll shelf. You can find how to make the dolls in this post. Brian knocked over the middle doll last year and broke her, but luckily that only adds to the creepiness of the setup.
I also decorated the bathroom as room 217 in The Shining again this year, although I forgot to take pictures. If you haven't already, you can check out last year's Halloween party post to get an idea of what it looked like.
My Creepy Doll Costume
I'm excited to present to you my enchanted porcelain wind up doll Halloween costume. I'll be posting tutorials for the wind up key as well as the toy box prop soon. I curled my hair by setting it in pin curls over night, which is a great no heat curling mechanism. While there are contemporary styling products that will help your pin curls retain their shape, I just pinned my wet hair in curls and slept like that over night. Since I didn't use any styling products, my curls would have lost some of their shape with brushing, so I opted to brush my hair before curling and then to not brush it out the following day. This left my curls a little frizzy, but I figured that since I was going for a possessed doll look, that didn't hurt.
To make the cracks on my forehead and jawline, I used a plain black e.l.f. eyeliner pencil. I had tested drawing the cracks with liquid liner previously, but I had better control with the pencil, so that's ultimately what I chose. However, the pencil I went with was not waterproof, so by the end of the party, some of the cracks were looking pretty smeared. I'll probably be trying this look again on Halloween day, so if anyone has any waterproof vegan eyeliner recommendations, let me know!
The Costume Contest
People showed up wearing a number of clever costumes, so the competition for our costume contest was pretty stiff. The top row, from left to right is Sarah as a ninja, mom as a unicorn, Brian's mom, dad as a hunter, me as an enchanted porcelain doll, Brian as a dark sorcerer who enchanted me, and Adam. The bottom row, from left to right is James as a mummy, Katie as Bunnicula, and Jacob.
James won "best costume" with his handmade mummy costume.
Katie won "most creative costume."
Brian and I won "best couples costume."
Halloween Trophies
My cat trophies tend to be pretty popular, so I decided to go with them again this year. It's always fun, if a bit challenging, choosing what costumes to give the cats. For the couples costume, I opted for zombies. I painted the cats green and then added a couple of coats of glow in the dark paint. I then painted their eyes red. I mixed together red and black paint (maybe a little brown as well; I can't remember now) to make a blood color and painted their paws and faces with this "blood." I used a pickle jar lid to create the base. I painted it black and then glued on the cats. I printed a trophy label and glued that onto the edge of the jar lid.
For the best costume trophy, I went with Pennywise. I glued the cat figurine to the olive jar lid and then painted the lid and the cat black. I made a ruffle collar by folding strips of off white paper accordion style and gluing them together. I then glued the collar around the cat's neck. I painted the eyes red. I used the same crimson paint that I used for the zombies to paint on a nose and makeup. Once the trophy was dry, I glued on a label.
For the "most creative" costume, I went with the Cat in the Hat. I glued the cat figurine to the olive jar lid and painted the lid and the cat black. I then painted the cat's eyes red. To make the hat, I cut out a circle from red cardstock and punched a hole in the center. This created the brim of the hat. I then cut out a strip of red cardstock and rolled it into a cylinder with the same diameter as the hole punch circle. I glued the cylinder to the brim and glued the circle I had punched from red cardstock to the top. I then cut off strips of white cardstock and glued them around the hat. I glued on a label to finish the trophy.
I hope you've enjoyed a peek at my Halloween party. For more inspiration, including alternate snacks as well as some activities, check out my 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, and 2014 party posts, as well as my X-Files, Goosebumps, and The Shining themed birthday party posts.
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