wordless wednesday
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| Why is that squirrel in our yard? |
talya
Grace Grits and Gardening
Farm. Food. Garden. Life.
Schnauzer Watchdogs
DIY Halloween Decor – Realistically Creepy Ideas!
This time of year I look at the world through orange-tinted glasses. While I may only appear to be walking the dogs, deadheading flowers, or grocery shopping, I’m planning my Halloween decor. I’m studying broken tree limbs and produce aisle bins filled with root vegetables wondering—can I turn this into a Halloween decoration?
Rather than buy expensive and/or cheesy decorations, I prefer to utilize things around my house, reclaim objects and display vintage finds from my two favorite neighborhood haunts (pun intended)—Curiosities and Dolly Python.
Here are a few of my favorite tips for creating a realistically eerie haunted house.
1. Think old. Old is naturally creepy when displayed correctly. Old dusty jars, old books, old black-and-white photos in cracked picture frames set a spooky tone.
2. Let your silver tarnish. This is the easiest tip of all. Serve food on tarnished trays. Make sinister arrangements in your silver teapot using twigs, dead plants and inexpensive plastic flowers spray-painted flat black or gunmetal gray.
3. Stack your scariest books on the mantle and in bookcases. Leaving a stack of gardening magazines or the new Jodi Picoult book on the coffee table won’t frighten anyone. When I searched through my entire library, I discovered I had quite the collection of classic horror to display.
4. Paint-by-art and other still-life works have a gothic feel.
5. From your computer, print basic pictures of ravens, bats, skeletons, and tape them over your regularly displayed family photos (onto the glass). Leaving your child’s soccer picture on the mantle won’t set a Halloween mood.
6. Dumpster dive for treasures. I found this mannequin on my neighbor’s curb. Painted black, she greets our guests.
7. Buy a $0.99 bag of cobwebs at Party City. Stretched thinly over candles, books, pictures, everywhere, these look like the real thing.
8. Hang shredded cheesecloth (found at Target and fabric/craft stores) in doorways, windows, and over tables. Cover furniture with cheesecloth or white sheets like an abandoned house.
9. Old doll heads are creepy without doing anything.
10. Buy a bag of plastic bones – scatter them in your fireplace (unlit of course!), float them in your pool and/or display them in a large jar.
11. Display doll parts.
12. At flea markets, look for inexpensive vintage pictures of people, strange plants, science class human body posters, etc.
13. Hide glow sticks behind books and inside vases to create an eerie purple or green glow.
14. Cut bats from felt and duct tape to your porch around your front door. Free-hand the bat design or download a template. (Use stiff felt and be careful when removing…the tape can pull off paint.)
15. Download and play scary music. REALLY scary music. Like the selection at the end of this post…
Do you decorate for Halloween? What are your favorite Halloween decorating tips?
Do you decorate for Halloween? What are your favorite Halloween decorating tips?
Happy Halloween!
Grace Grits and Gardening
Farm. Food. Garden. Life.
Musical Pairing:
Tubular Bells
Chopped Cobb Salad with Chick Peas
This version of a Cobb salad is perfect when you’re in the mood for a light dinner, yet you want something more substantial than a basic tossed salad. This is also a great way to use up all those veggies in your crisper that seemed like a great idea at time but somehow never made it into the week’s menu.
With traditional ingredients like bacon and boiled eggs plus a few updates such as goat cheese and chick peas, what’s not to love? Plus, arranging the ingredients in rows, makes dinner more festive. We southern girls know about food presentation…
Ingredients
(serves two main courses)
3 1/2 cups fresh greens – including spinach and kale
4 boiled eggs, chopped
5 slices of bacon, crumbled
1 cup chick peas
3/4 cup goat cheese crumbles
4-5 green onions, chopped
olive oil
balsamic vinegar
fresh ground black pepper
sea salt
Crumble and/or chop ingredients so that pieces are relatively uniform.
Arrange on dinner plates in rows, alternating ingredients and food colors with greens in the center.
Drizzle with olive oil and vinegar (or other favorite dressing). Sprinkle with pepper and sea salt to taste.
If you have a house divided (like mine)—vegetarians and carnivores—set up a mini-salad bar and let each design his or her own plate. Substitute avocado for the bacon and veggie lovers will be happy.
For meat-lovers, add or substitute shredded turkey and/or chicken—whatever’s on hand.
Yummy!
talya
Grace Grits and Gardening
Farm. Food. Garden. Life.
