A change of attitude - Halloween can be fun

I have never been a big fan of Halloween.  It wasn't one of the holidays I really enjoyed.  I've never liked to be scared.  I had friends that loved haunted houses and so I would try to be brave and go along only to be terrified and crying.  And then, as kids are, I would be made fun of because I cried.  When I was 10 or 11 I had a scary situation with trick or treating.  Me and my friends were walking around our neighborhood.  There were maybe 4 or 5 of us.  We were only a block away from home and without any parents because we felt we were old enough to be alone.  As we walked up one side of the street, strangers were walking down the other side.  Soon those strangers crossed the street and approached us and asked for our candy.  We wouldn't give it to them so they tried to grab our bags from us.  We took off running home and as we rounded the corner we found my dad and the neighbors dad.  Seems as if these strange boys had been in our neighborhood causing trouble too.  One kid had asked my dad for a drink and then proceeded to follow him into the house and observe all of the things we had in the house.  It made my Dad nervous enough that he watched them as they left and they started to ruin the neighbors pumpkins.  We all jumped in the car and circled around trying to find them.  And we did.  There is an orchard a couple blocks away and they were hiding there.  Their buddy pulled up in a van to get them and we took down the van's license plate # and description and called the cops.  That kinda ended the trick or treat fun for me.  That was the last year I dressed up.

But as the kids are getting older I realized that I didn't want to be the one to ruin their fun.  And there are so many other options to trick or treating now.  So, I actually bought Halloween decorations and had a ton of fun doing it.  I even made some of my own. 

The wreath for the door.  Hard to see but there are little white ghosts in there too.

Spiders and webs to crawl around the house

A bat hanging from the chandelier

My canvas art

This is our new Halloween village.   I guess that's what you call it?  Brian has always wanted a Christmas village but since I collect nativities we just don't have the room to display them.  So I asked him if he wanted to start a Halloween village instead. 

A few posts ago I wrote about us finding a bargain deal in Park City at the Michaels.  Well, a couple of these houses were our bargain.  Michaels had been selling them for 50% off.  We had gone to the Riverdale store and there were none in stock, we went to the Layton store and found the "Pumpkin Patch".  We had her check other stores and they had nothing in stock.  So we came home and Brian ordered the "Haunted Mine" online.  Thinking we had spent enough money we thought that would be all that we would get this year.  When we went to the Michaels in Park City they were still 50% off plus another 20% off your entire purchase that weekend.  They had everything in stock.  It was a super nice new store with a new layout and I loved the friendly service there too.  We picked up the other two houses and extra people and trees for less than the cost of the one we bought on the internet.

"Haunted Mine"  This actually has sound too, and the little guys in the cart go around on the track. 

"Haunted Cabin"

The pumpkin patch

Autumn House

Then I started to make my other decorations.  I shouldn't watch Good Things Utah and Studio Five.  They just give me too many ideas!

This is actually a Halloween Countdown.  Very very easy!  I bought a magnetic white board from Walmart.  I bought Halloween diecuts from Hobby Lobby (in the scrapbook section, already cutout and glittered.)  I added magnets to the back of the diecuts, added a vinyl tree from my silhouette, and a few paper leaves from my silhouette.  All done.  The kids were allowed to add something to the picture each day.

I had made these from my silhouette last year and they were used again this year.

These were my favorite things.  I loved how they turned out.  I bought a really cute witch hat a Walmart and then wanted to add potions and spell books.  I bought some of the glass things at Michaels, others at the dollar store, and others at the DI. The books were just cheap DI books I spray painted black and added scrapbook paper. Then it took me awhile but I found the labels online.  I love them!

Moonbeams, Potions, Tonic, Graveyard dust, pickled eyeballs.
 I also had some with Rats, skulls, Spiders, and earthworms.