Styling the Basket – Halloween!

I have a confession – I am not a huge Halloween person. I like getting dressed up as much as anyone (possibly more than many), and I admire people who go all-out with decorating for the holiday, but it’s just not my thing. If I was going to decorate more than the bare minimum I do outside, it would be all scarecrows and pumpkins anyway. I was at the Home Depot the other day and found myself wondering who exactly wants a 6-foot werewolf that looked like a cross between a rabid dog and a rat on their lawn! No offense if you have or want one – that’s what makes the world go around!

That being said, Halloween is a holiday, it’s halfway through October, and I have styled the basket accordingly. This was fun – I had two jars that had one flat side (a company sent them to my old office), so I painted them white and drew spider webs on them. I bought some pumpkins at the dollar store and a few at Michael’s that matched the polka-dot pumpkin I bought last year. I also bought some Halloween garland at the dollar store for the fireplace. I moved the things I had for fall around and voila…Halloween decorations.

First I painted them with two coats of white craft paint.

Then I drew a spider web with a pencil.

Next, I went over the pencil lines with a Sharpie. I erased where I didn’t write over the pencil completely. If you look at this picture, it looks a little smeary, but when you see the finished product, you really don’t see any smearing. Remember, most things don’t need to be nearly as perfect as you think (or maybe that’s just me who thinks that!)
Next, I glittered two small battery-operated candles I had on hand. Yes…glitter. I know it’s the worst, but I generally manage to contain it by using a dollar store half pan lined with parchment paper. The half-pan gives the glitter no place to go (or at least fewer places to go), and the parchment paper allows for two things – first, you can pick it up if you need to use some of the extra glitter, and second, things with glue tend not to stick to it.

After glittering the candles, put on a layer of Mod Podge. If you don’t use Mod Podge often, you’ll get nervous because it looks like you just put big smears of white glue all over everything, but no worries – it dries clear!

The whole thing took about two days, counting one trip to the dollar store and one trip to Target to find the pumpkin for the middle. Here’s the finished product: 

(the plant looks a little scary, but it’s not dying, I’m reviving it!)

Imagine what I could do if I liked Halloween! 🙂 Hope your Halloween decorating is a HOWLING success!