Simple scares
Easy Halloween crafts for some quick haunted house decorations
Spider web
What you need
- 3 ice cream sticks; you could also use twigs or skewers
- White wool, yarn, twine, or thick cotton thread
- PVA glue or any other glue that will stick to wood
- A plastic spider (or cut out the shape of a spider from black paper)
What you do
- Glue the three sticks into a star shape. You want them to look like an asterisk (*).
- Attach the wool by putting the popsicle stick star on the wool, leaving about a 5cm long tail, and then wrapping the wool around the sections in the middle, tying a knot at the end to make sure the whole star is secure.
- Start wrapping the wool around the sticks to make the web. First you pass the wool over one of the sticks, then you wrap it under, so there is a loop around the stick. Then you move onto the next stick. You move around the star in a clockwise motion, but you wrap in an anti-clockwise motion.
- When you finish, tie a double knot to secure the weaving, and leave a long thread so you can hang the web.
- Pop on a plastic spider and you’re ready to scare your nearest arachnophobe.
Mummy orange
What you need
- An orange
- Long strips of tissue paper, toilet paper, or narrow bandages
- Googly eyes
- Masking tape
- Glue dots
What you do
- Add the eyes to the orange by attaching the googly eyes with the glue dots.
- Take a long strip of tissue paper. Fold it in half lengthways, and then in half again. This makes it narrow enough to wrap around and look like bandages.
- Tape one end of the folded strip of tissue paper to the top of the orange above the eyes, and then start to wrap around the fruit. As you wrap, try to cover up the masking tape. If you run out of paper before you’ve finished wrapping, just fold some more up, attach it with tape, and keep going.
- Don’t worry if your wraps aren’t perfectly aligned. As long as they cover the orange you’ll be fine. After all, mummies are pretty scruffy looking things.
- Make lots to decorate the place. You could wrap other things as well (mummified apples, or mangoes, or maybe even bananas?) The best bit? You can eat the fruit when Halloween is over!
Halloween bunting
What you need
- A sheet of paper
- Pencil or markers
- Scissors
- Tape
What you do
- Cut the paper in half lengthways. Tape the ends together so you have a long narrow strip.
- Fold the paper up, concertina style - you fold one way and then the other, so it looks like a “z” from the side. It is important to fold back and forth, like a fan.
- Draw your design on the top face of the paper. You can draw whatever you want, but we have some suggestions here. Just remember a couple of things:
- The picture has to go off each side - this is how it connects. So the spider legs, or the sides of the ghost, for example, are what keep them together.
- If you write words, then every second one will be backwards.
- Cut around your design, making sure you leave it connected in places at the side.
- Unfold and string it up. You can, of course, make more and tape it all together.
- Draw any extra features if you want to make it look more impressive. Also think about using black paper or other colours.
Have fun!