Literary Halloween Crafts

I actually own (very different) books about Dr. Jekell and Mr. Hyde, the classic is on my e-reader and the other is pictured below and is also a good tale written by Beth Fantaskey.

Being the book nerd that I am...The Strange Case of Dr. Jekell and Mr. Hyde along with a few other tragic tales has always been a favorite of mine to read during Halloween time, so this year I thought I'd tie in a extra spooky craft to go along with it! I love this particular story and I've always been drawn to Victorian Era literature style of writing, there is just something romantic about it, even in this novel by Robert Louis Stevenson.

In this craft I decided to change the idea of Dr. Jekell being a man and created him actually into a her... cool right?!? Maybe a part of me wonders what it would be like to dabble in the realms of my subconscious and see if I have a Mrs. Hyde of my own? LOL!  These crafts were way easy to construct and were VERY inexpensive too! Most of the materials came from the dollar tree and Micheal's with their fabulous coupons that I normally get in e-mail, text message or mail anyway. I think all together I might have spent about 10 bucks total!

My Dr. Jekyll and Mrs. Hyde Skull came from the dollar tree, as did the candle stick and glass plate that I hot glued together. While waiting for those pieces to set, I spray painted the skull black first, once the black dried I then pulled a old fishnet stocking over the face of the skull and sprayed (in small bursts) a bit of the purple spray paint I had left over from making the spell books. I then let that dry completely and started to paint the paper mache pumpkin from Micheal's ($3.00 on sale). After the pumpkin dried completely I took a sharpie and one of my favorite excerpt from the book and started to hand write it over the outside. I sprayed the pumpkin with some Krylon clear coat and wrapped a Halloween ribbon (from the dollar tree) around the stem and wa-la! Once my skull was completely dried, I cut the top hat off headband I got from Micheal's ($3.99 on sale), fired up the glue gun and glued it to the top of the skull. I added the black and green flower by clipping it on the side and then painted the lettering for the sign onto some heavy card stock. I threw some of the cheap dollar tree spider webbing under neath the glass stand I constructed and placed last years cupcake sprinkle test tube rack near my new Dr. Jekell and Mrs. Hyde skull and ta-da! Instant fabulous and spooky literary Halloween craft! What do you think?

My little pumpkin patch by the fireplace. The monogrammed pumpkin is from Hobby Lobby and was bought last year and the black and orange was made by me using a maple leaf for the outline, inside it says 1692 which was the start of the Salem Witch Trials, another of my favorite non-fiction reads!

Halloween Decor, Crafts and Fun!

So it's officially Fall, the weather is cooler, the stores are loaded up with Halloween decor (and some even with Christmas decor, OH MY!) and I can't wait a minute longer to put out my decorations either! I never feel like I get enough of my Halloween decorations and they are my favorites! Seriously one month is just not long enough! When do you put up your Halloween decor?

I think you all have met my spooky eyeball wreath from last year but just in case you forgot, here he is :)

I have spruced up my cotton branch by the fireplace with a little fall sunflower and our monogram pumpkin!

Mr. Bones has also found a new spot this year atop my glass lantern and I have cramped my fingers away at crocheting a giant spiderweb this year!

The spread of Halloween continues in my sitting room and has possibly grown twice the size from last years! LOL!

I had also decided to craft up a few new decorations this year, since I now a nice writers table in my front room and it's still such a big open space hat needs filling... so... with that I took my favorite things about Halloween and ran with it! You can see the new additions for this year below :)

New this year is my stacked witches books... ohhh so creepy! LOL! Very easy to make, the books are from Michaels and you can find them for $4.99 each. I then just spray painted them and printed out some words from the computer and then aged them using tea bags!

I used the same effect with making the fortune tellers cards, they are simply just printed images I found on the internet and modpodged on some heavy card stock paper, aged again with tea bags, glossed over with some modpodge and then dried with a hair dryer to give that aged curled edge.

This is mostly for the kiddo and her costume this year but thought it might sit nicely a top the witches books... she is going to be Snow White for Halloween this year and I found a lovely pin on pinterest on how to make your very own poisoned apple. Incredibly easy to make... one fake apple from craft store, 2 small bottles of puffy paint, and some green glitter later this little baby was made!

And since I love all things Sleepy Hallow... I decided I might like a subway art tribute to it! The fake pumpkin is from Home Depot ... yes, Home Depot they are way cheaper there for the big ones! $9.00 you just can't beat that Michaels or Joanns. The letters are from Joanns and the mask from Michaels. I have always loved the idea of Ichabod Crane and Katrina Van Tassel and the Van Tassel's Harvest Ball... it's my favorite part in the story!

And of course what would a tribute to Sleepy Hallow be without the actual invitation to Ichabod from the Van Tassels! That's right! What you see here is the same written invitation you've seen Katrina write to Ichabod in the movies (mostly the Disney version) and I just love it! I used heavy card stock again and just wrote it all out with a sharpie, I added some left over ribbon I had at the bottom and then melted a red crayon to make the "waxed seal" and drops of "blood".

This fortune tellers crystal ball is quite possibly my other favorite item I acquired this year! This I didn't actually craft but I did get it from Big Lots of all places! I thought how perfect is this to go with my tarot cards! I just love the colors in it!

And of course the final picture...

On top of all this decorating I've been itching to try venture out and have some fall fun, we will probably be taking the kiddo to the local corn maze and pumpkin patch in a few weeks since we've now turned that into pretty much a family tradition. I will miss our farm that we always went to in Mississippi but it will be nice to explore a new one this year! I also really would love to take a weekend trip up to New England... I've been chatting with my mom about this and we have been talking about maybe doing it next year since she's pretty much used up all her vacation time already this year. But... next year it is SO on! I want to see Boston, Salem and possibly the Pilgrim village in Plymouth! How cool would that be? So in the mean time this year I will just have to surround myself with all things Fall and New England style LOL! How are you celebrating the season?

It's starting to look a bit creepy around here...

I told myself months ago that I WOULD NOT make Halloween crafts BEFORE October 1st. Well... so much for that! In all honesty I could not help myself. I was in the dollar tree yesterday, looking for potential craft items for the new Girl Scout troop I got suckered into Co-Lead.  And well I sorta stumbled upon some awesome mason jars, and what can I say... Mason jars always have a soft spot in my crafty little heart. They are just so cute and you can turn them into just about anything! Annnnnd it just so happened that the glass candle holders were riiiiiiight next to them on the shelf....honestly, I think someone at dollar tree is setting me up LOL! So who could resit right? So I bought those, some candy corn and some cheap creepy crawlies for the inside and WAH-LA! Instant cute decorative candy jars for Halloween! :)

And if that all wasn't enough... I decided to make a new fall wreath for my front door. Don't worry... I still have my fabulous eyeball Halloween wreath from last year that I will hang up when it gets closer to Halloween. I just wanted to make one that I could keep up for after Halloween and all through the month of November. :)

What do you guys think?