Last year, right about this time, we published our 31 days of October craftiness and y’all loved it, so here it is again! (We have changed the calendar to match 2017’s October, to make it easier and up-to-date.) These projects are (mostly) pretty quick and we hope you find it as helpful and inspiring as in 2016.
Last year we wrote:
So, someone in our idea room got the idea to create 31 days of craft projects for you, our dear Finderskeepians. And we did it. But it was really hard. And Rachel got the stomach flu. So, here it is. But on the 7th, instead of the 1st.
We really hope you enjoy this. So, go ahead. Bring a little October into your life. And please let us know how it goes! We’d love to hear from you. #31DaysOfOctober on Instagram!
Just click on one of the little squares, below, and be whisked away into a wondrous place. A place like none other. A place we like to call–Craftopia.
Happy Haunting!
01 Get Inspired
Sarah has been collecting the best Halloween ideas for food, costumes and home decor for years. And it’s all right there, on our Pinterest board. Help yourself!
02 Plan a Costume
We come from the tradition that Halloween costumes are best when they are (a) homemade, and (b) super creative or, at least, just a little smart aleck-y. Check out these sites for this year’s winners of the FK Costume of the Year Award.
- 20 Clever Last Minute Costume Ideas from Women’s Day Magazine
- Family Halloween Costumes That Are Absolutely Fantastic from BuzzFeed
- Hoodie Costumes from Parents.com
03 Fill Your Home with Fall
Fill your home with fall candles and/or reed diffusers. For you to feel truly embroiled in the brisk, homey comfort of fall, you need your home to smell the part. Check out these sites for this year’s Autumn home fragrances.
04 Create a Fall Planting
If you have a front stoop (lucky you! We love stoops!), flank your entrance with some pots filled with new plantings in fall colors. If you are afraid of plants (you know who you are), because you are always killing them, no worries! Use succulents in fall colors–they require almost no care–or go ahead and let them die and then–voila!–you have one more Halloween decoration! Check out our Pinterest board for some inspiration here.
05 Make a Pumpkin Topiary
This was one of our ideas from last year and we loved it so much we wanted to include it again this year. Here’s our article from last year for more information on how to make this Halloween topiary.
06 Hang a Garland
Hang a fall or Halloween themed garland. We created our garland from a kit by Stampin’ Up!, but you could also create your own, or….just clip some Project Life Halloween or Autumn themed 3×4 cards to some twine with some tiny clothespins. Easy!
07 Use Essential Oils
Put cinnamon or nutmeg or pumpkin spice essential oil on a cotton ball and put in your vacuum cleaner bag and then vacuum your house. Sarah has been doing this for years (she matches the fragrance to the season–try geranium oil in the Spring) and her house always smells terrific. Added bonus: it makes vacuuming just that much more exciting.
08 Make Some Gingerbread
Here is Sarah’s recipe for gingerbread. It is really, really, really good.
If you are not a cook, try the Trader Joe’s gingerbread mix, which is the best one on the market, in our humble opinion.
09 Decorate with Fall Colors
Bring fall colors into your home with pillows, table runners, or bowls filled with colorful leaves, gourds, or even acorns! Check out our Autumn Decor Ideas board on Pinterest here.
10 Make a Campfire
If you have a fire pit, have a campfire.
11 Make a Spooky, Spooky Picture
Alter this 
to make a spooky, spooky picture. (Click to view full size, then save image to your desktop to print.) We got the idea from Country Sampler’s Autumn Decorating magazine. But they wanted us to (we are not making this up) scour our local thrift store or flea market until we found a print that would work. Ahem. No time. And, frankly, every once and awhile we come across some terrific craft that calls for finding something at a thrift store–like vintage tea towels–and it makes us wonder where these thrift stores are that have beautiful, vintage tea towels or gently aged lace table runners or antique apothecary boxes. Our local thrift stores have smelly, stained terry cloth towels and chipped dishes. Seriously. So we created a printable, just for you!
12 Get a Pedi
Get a Halloween or fall-themed pedi. ‘Nuff said. Check out our halloween pedi Pinterest board here.
13 Create a Halloween Playlist
Put together a playlist. Here are some suggestions:
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Uma Thurman by Fallout Boy Thriller by Michael Jackson The Prologue from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone soundtrack by John Williams Purple People Eater by George Thorogood Honky Tonk Halloween by Captain Clegg and the Night Creatures Witch Doctor by Sha Na Na Love Potion No. 9 by The Searchers Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want by the Smiths This is Halloween from the Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack The Addams Family theme by The Surf Dawgs Hey Ho for Halloween from the Ultimate Kids Halloween Party Album Ghosts Are Very Frightening by from the Ultimate Kids Halloween Party Album |
Mr. Nobody from the Ultimate Kids Halloween Party AlbumGhostbusters by Ray Parker, Jr. Time Warp from from The Rocky Horror Picture Show Dark Lady by Cher Do the Hippogriff from the Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire soundtrack This is the Night from the Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire soundtrack Magic Works from the Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire soundtrack Livin’ La Vida Loca by Eddie Murphy and Antonio Banderas (our preferred edition–try Ricky Martin, too!) I Put a Spell on You from the Ultimate Kids Halloween Party Album Friends on the Other Side by Keith David (Princess and the Frog soundtrack) Shadow Man by Keith David (Princess and the Frog soundtrack) Poison Ivy by the Coasters |
14 Take Autumn Photos
If you are lucky enough to live in an area where the leaves change, take a stroll and capture that beauty! The pictures you take will make wonderful additions to holiday cards and memory layouts. Be sure to check out our Pinterest board for some inspiration here.
15 Go Ahead, Glitter Some Bones
Sarah made this decoration by gathering a plastic skull and some bones, applying some multi-purpose glue in sections (using a paint brush), and sprinkling some fine glitter in different shades of green. Then she used some store-bought resin bones and sprayed them with a gold glitter spray. She filled a large, decorative bowl with dried moss and then arranged the glittered items on top of it. Voila! Beautiful and spooky!
16 Decorate with Leaves
This was super easy. We just used a garland of dried leaves and berries and folded it up to fit into the ceramic swan that lives on Sarah’s piano. Last year we filled the swan with faux black roses, which was also pretty, and just a little bit spooky.
17 Make Some Butternut Squash Soup
This is Sarah’s famous Butternut Squash Soup and everyone loves it. Enjoy.
18 Plant a Succulent
Too cute, right?? If you don’t have any Funkins lying around, just plant some succulents in fall colors, to add to that stoop arrangement we spoke of earlier.
19 Get Some Bloody Washi
Add some bloody washi to your planner, and not just in the British sense. Although we don’t carry this washi in our online store, we believe in giving credit where credit is due–Snaps for you, Michaels! Best washi, ever!
Here is a collection of Sarah’s planner pages, done up with said washi:
20 Make Some Hot Apple Cider
Put cider in a crock pot w cinnamon sticks, sliced oranges and star anise and let it simmer.
21 Plan Your Halloween Menu
Planning ahead will make it so much easier to shop, cook and have a (reasonably) stress-free pah-tay.
Check out Food Networks Halloween Food Ideas here.
22 Use Our Party Planning Printable
Over the years, as Sarah planned various gatherings for friends and relatives, and as her compulsive organizational tendencies took over, she developed a system for putting all the little tasks that are involved in parties together into one place. In the end, she would take an 11×17 piece of printer paper and divide it into 4 quadrants, each for tracking 4 areas of planning a party:
- planning a menu
- timing the meal
- tracking rsvps
- tracking to do lists
We have created this printable for you (holiday-printable pdf), in case you might like to give it a try. Let us know how it goes! #HolidayPlanning on Instagram.
23 Gather Your Pumpkins
We are kind of lucky to have a small, historic farm nearby that sets up a pumpkin patch each year. But it really doesn’t matter where you get your pumpkins, as long as you get them! They are a Halloween mandate!
24 Pile Some Pumpkins
Create a pile of pumpkins on your steps or in your front hall
25 Carve Yourself Some Pumpkins
Carve your pumpkins. Your jack-o-lanterns don’t need to be fancy to make people happy. We love our kid’s carvings the most. And, if you’re not patient enough to make a face, check out Sarah’s “jail”–it only requires a rectangle window and some brown (plastic coated) wire she found in the garage.
- Funny Pumplin Carving Ideas from Woman’s Day Magazine
- Traditional Pumpkin Carving Ideas from DIY Network
26 Create a Horror Tableau
Create a horror tableau on your front porch
27 Say It with Cheesecloth
Cheesecloth is so cool for creating terrific Halloween decor. Check out our Halloween board, with loads of cheesecloth ideas on Pinterest here.
28 Use Old Lace Tablecloths
Pick up tattered lace tablecloths at the thrift store (or, if you’re like us, you may have some of your own….ahem….) and drape them askew on table or chairs. Sarah has two old, mismatched lace tablecloths that just got a little worn out. Alone, they would be too small for her buffet table, but she just drapes them askew and overlapping in the middle for an “old, creepy house” look.
29 Use Spider Webs with Abandon
Cover every surface imaginable with fake spider webs. Sarah here (Rach can’t stand spiders). We just use those cotton spider webs all over our house and then attach 3 large spiders we picked up at Target one year. Super easy. Very effective. Added bonus: When your house is covered in webs, we don’t have to worry about whether our windows are clean or our house need painting; it’s just part of the effect! Don’t you just love Halloween???
30 Hang Halloween Wreaths
Hang wreaths up the stairs. This is super quick and easy way to add something fun to your Halloween decor. We bought some black wreaths (available at craft stores–we got ours at Cost Plus at an after-Halloween sale) and just tied them to the banister with wide, red, wire-edged ribbon. We tied bows and crimped the dangling ends of the bows for a Halloween feel.
Or even just a fall themed wreath for some added hominess.
31 Fill a Cauldron with Candy
And, to finish off this month, as the sun begins to descend, fill a cauldron–or go the other direction and fill a fancy, crystal bowl–with Halloween candy. Then just sit back and let the trick-or-treaters roll in.