Tricks and Treats: 8 Decorating Ideas for a Spooktacular Halloween

Ali Swank

Ghosts and goblins lurking behind eerie trees, chilling tombstones in neighborhood yards, and don't forget about the Great Pumpkin. Is your home a ghoulish haunted house for trick-or-treaters? We asked Shine readers to share their spooky decorating and snack secrets for a hair-raising Halloween. Here are 8 tricks and treats to try this All Hallow’s Eve:

Tricks

1. Conjure up a sorcerer’s centerpiece. "Create a centerpiece to make your neighbors wonder how you really spend Halloween night. Turn the dining room table into a witch's favorite spot by gathering up all the spellbinding knickknacks you can find. Items like candles, dried gourds and interesting bottles can be combined with outdoor treasures, such as lichens, seedpods, and mosses, to create what appears to be a very well-stocked sorcery table. If available, blown bird eggs, cicada skins, dead beetles, dried bones, and antlers are bewitching additions, too." – Danielle Darling

2. Look into the past. "Bring the warmth and memories of Halloween's past by replacing current framed photographs with pictures of costumed friends and family from previous years. Dig out these hidden treasures that are often long forgotten and display them for all to see. Add additional frames and paint them black, gluing on twigs from the yard, dried colored leaves (real or artificial), or a Halloween silhouette, such as a black cat or witch's hat. Lightly add touches of fake spider webs over the framed pictures and, perhaps, a plastic spider or two." – Jackie Hardin

3. Go vintage, really vintage. "A quick and easy way to make paper look old is to stain it with a little something everyone probably already has in the cabinet – coffee. For this project, I printed on parchment paper and just stained the edges for a tattered, vintage look. To keep the vintage effect going, you can also stain white votive candles with the rest of the coffee mixture." – A.M. Horton

4. Take the party outside. "We began a tradition of offering refreshments to the hundreds of adults that come up the driveway on Halloween. One year, our neighbor saw us giving out coffee and cookies, so his wife, a coupon addict, managed to score hundreds of free hot dogs and hot dog buns. Our neighbor pulled out his grill and gave out free hot dogs to the masses. Between our coffee and cookies and his hot dogs, the line into our neighborhood even attracted a fire engine, which drove through and gave out candy." – Nikole Hahn

5. Not feeling the gory stuff? Go Seasonal. "For  classy Halloween décor, set out colorful leaves and pumpkins instead of spider webs and jack-o-lanterns. The mantle above the fireplace is a great place to decorate. Add a garland of fall leaves, some small pumpkins, and candles to it, and it's all ready to go. Finding pumpkins of various colors, such as green and yellow, help make different pieces standout. Using artificial pieces rather than choosing to go fresh can help your displays last longer, even until Thanksgiving!" – Michelle Stevens

Treats

6. Create creepy, crawly cookies. "Nothing's creepier than eating spiders during Halloween, and few things are quite as delicious. You don't have to get really fancy to create fun Halloween cookies; you just need pretzel sticks and your favorite, stiff cookie batter (chocolate and sugar cookies both work well). Cover the cookies and the pretzel legs in melted chocolate and chocolate sprinkles. Complete the effect by placing red candies near the top of the cookie for the eyes." – KC Morgan

7. Serve shocking snacks. "Scatter fake bugs and stuffed dates on a plate to present a dish of edible roaches! Cheese sticks rounded at the ends and dotted with food coloring create excellent 'finger foods.' Let a 'severed head' serve as your table centerpiece by wrapping a decorative plastic skull in slices of cured meat with olive eyes, of course." – Paige Vignola

8. Scare up a sweet dessert.

"Bowls of bulk candy simply won't do for a high-class Halloween party, so add some creepy class to the affair by whipping up a few white chocolate cherry cheesecakes that are embellished with a spider web design. Begin with an Oreo crust for a spooky black color, and then simply follow the instructions for a white chocolate cheesecake with cherry swirls. Finally, drag a knife lightly through the cherry swirls on top before baking and you'll wind up with a spider web effect when it's done. Display whole cakes decorated with a single candy spider on top, or splurge on a candy spider for every serving. And don't forget to slather the slices with cherry sauce dripping like blood." – Christine Bartsch