Book Review: Happy Halloween!

Two of my favorite entities–Country Living and Sterling Publishing–have joined forces to give us a treat, Happy Halloween! This book has everything, and I mean everything, you need to spook, chill, carve, cook, sew, cut, serve, wear and decorate for Halloween. All of Country Living’s best Halloween ideas in 223 pages. Find tons of pumpkin carving ideas (including traditional, scary, silly, unique and refined), handmade decor, recipes for cocktails, drinks, treats and party fare, and how-tos for creating costumes.

Just a few things you can do with this book:

–carve flames into pumpkins for your fireplace

–make your own skeleton luminaries

–float tissue paper ghosts in your window

–create a gourd-topped candelabra

–make a haunted house for your kid’s party

–serve pumpkin bisque and apple and sage chicken at your grown-up party

–make and decorate your own fall-themed cakes

–dress your wee one up as Little Red Riding Hood or a scary lion

Now that I finally have a nice, roomy house full of decorating possibilities, once my kitchen is actually in place and our piles of boxes have cleared (having moved recently to a fixer-upper in desperate need of fixer-upping), I’ll be sure to use this book heartily and post more ideas. In the interim, you can find Happy Halloween! HERE at Sterling or HERE at amazon.com or your favorite book store or site, and click HERE for tons of Halloween ideas at Country Living.

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Whenever you go to the beach with kids, you’re sure to come home with some seashells and more than a little sand. Let’s use some of those treasures to make fun crafts.

This handprint craft is made with a sand-infused salt dough and some little shells from the beach. It’s a cute way to remember how little your kids were on that beach trip. Find the instructions at From Under a Palm Tree.

Here’s another take on sand dough that was used to make little ornaments and sculptures. Get the details from Pink Stripey Socks.

Moms and Crafters used air dry clay and seashells to make these cute necklaces. She used the storebought clay but you can also make your own air dry clay if you’d rather.

Crafts on Sea used a shell to make a whale, but I’m sure you could take this idea and make lots of different creatures. I love the idea of sea creatures made with shells like fish or a jellyfish or an octopus using the same method. They also have a seashell decoration made with salt dough that’s really cute and would be fun for kids to paint. Poke a hole before it dries for hanging if you want.

Or take a bunch of little shells and decorate a frame like these from Rhythms of Play. They used a handprint instead of a picture but you could also put in a picture from the beach trip.

This is probably one for the mamas to make because it uses epoxy, but I also wanted to share these cute and easy shell hair pins from Thrifty Mama Ramblings, which kids are sure to want for their mermaid pretend play.

Or how about some sensory play straight from the beach? Use store bought sand if you don’t have a beach nearby to make this beach sand slime from The Mama Notes. Thrown in some shells and kids will love playing with this one.

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Have you read?