Spook-Tacular Halloween

The kids are back in school, there's a nip in the night air, and football season is underway. That means that Halloween is right around the corner. And that's good news for most Americans.

Everyone knows that the most popular holiday is Christmas. But did you know that the annual Fall Festival of Fright ranks third in popularity, just behind Thanksgiving? According to a Harris poll conducted in 2011, Halloween is the third most popular holiday among American adults.

So in honor of America's third most popular holiday, here are five ghoulishly great suggestions for having a fiendishly fine time this Halloween:

 

1. Borrow Lights From the Most Popular Holiday: We’re all about using modern LED lights for spectacular Christmas lighting. But LED Christmas lights work great for celebrating Halloween, too (and other holidays). Since Halloween is heavily color-themed, you can quickly and easily browse LED bulbs of a particular color by using the "" feature in our online store

You can use LED lights to decorate your home in Halloween-themed colors. Use them to eerily light walkways for guiding little trick-or-treaters right to your door. Place battery-powered LEDs inside carved pumpkins for generating a ghostly glow from within.

2. Whip up Some Ghoulishly Good Treats: Is there any holiday that offers more opportunities for having fun with food than     Halloween? Probably not! Here are a few sinfully simple and repulsively disgusting (yet delicious!) ideas to try:

    • Ear wax, anyone? Place mini-marshmallows on sticks or toothpicks, and dip into molten caramel. Looks like used ear swabs (eww!). See how it looks here.
    • Ghoul-Aid Punch. Select one of your favorite Halloween masks, and seal it with tape so that you can turn it upside-down and fill with water. Freeze overnight, remove ice from the mask, and float the 'face' in a bowl of your favorite punch - colored blood red, of course.
    • Wiener Worms. Slice hot dog wieners into lengthwise quarters. Grill the strips until thoroughly cooked. They'll curl up worm-like as they cook. Serve in buns or alone

3. Create Some Spooky Decorations: Ghosts, goblins, and ghouls, oh my! Here are some very easy ideas for Halloween décor:

      • Chicken Wire Ghosts: Form the chicken wire into a ghost-like shape, drape with white cloth (old sheet or cheesecloth), and set aglow from within using LED lights.
      • Stenciled Pumpkins: Avoid the fuss and muss of scooping the guts out of pumpkins for creating traditional jack-o-lanterns. Instead, create (or buy) stencils of any shape you desire and use them to spray-paint images upon pumpkins. And then after the holiday, you can still use the pumpkins for pies!
      • Glowing Ghouls: Snap a light stick and place it inside a large balloon. Inflate the balloon, and draw a ghastly, ghostly face on it. Create several and use to light a room ghoulish-style

4. Quick-And-Easy Costumes: Great Halloween costumes don't have to be expensive, or require hours of painstaking labor to create.        Here are a few ideas:

        • T-shirt Skeleton: Draw the outline of a rib cage on a white t-shirt, cut out the between-the-lines areas, and wear over a black shirt.
        • Toilet Paper Mummy. TP yourself so that you're all wrapped up like a mummy. Use some tape here and there to hold it all in place. And then stay out of the rain!
        • Backwards Man (or woman): Just wear your clothes backward. (You might need a little help buttoning-up!)

5. Fun Halloween Party Themes: Halloween time is party time! And there's no end to the great party theme ideas you can use to have a  chillingly good time. Here are some suggestions:

          • Angels and Demons: Divide your party space into two zones: heaven and hell. Decorate each accordingly, and stock with theme-appropriate foods (angel food cake vs. devil's food cake; cloud-like marshmallows vs. red-hot candies; etc.) Each guest can come costumed as either a heavenly saint or a devilish demon.
          • Classic Creeps: Invite guests to come dressed as classic monsters from the silver screen. Dracula and Frankenstein are obvious enough. But how about more obscure classics like The Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Mole People, or Nosferatu?
          • Flashback Fright. Pick a decade from days past, and invite guests to come costumed accordingly. The Roaring Twenties, the Nifty Fifties, or the Swinging Sixties, for example.

One More Great Thing About Halloween…

Halloween is the third most popular holiday. So everyone looks forward to Halloween rolling around each year.

But one more great thing about Halloween? When Halloween hits, the most popular holiday is less than eight weeks away!

So as Halloween approaches if you don't yet have this year's Christmas décor all planned out, with everything you'll need on order or on hand - well, that ought to give you a bit of a fright!