Pumpkin Caterpillar

A chain of Jack o’ Lanterns makes a cool haunted scene on your stoop or lining your porch. Create a “caterpillar” by carving thin stripes or round spots in your pumpkins, along with a spooky insect face in your final pumpkin. Light the chain with a series of pumpkin lights or a string of cool-bulb holiday lights and watch your guests enjoy the effect.

Cheesecloth Ghosts

Make your own hovering haunts with raggedy cheesecloth aged with hot tea. Use heavy flexible wire to form the arms for your ghost, then drape with the long, raggedy fabric. Stuff the head and tie or sew in shape with thread, then hang your fluttering ghosts from the porch rafters. For an extra-spooky touch, try painting faces on your ghosts with black paint or using a needle and thread to sculpt features from the excess facial cloth.

Scarecrow

Whether a creepy guardian or fun symbol of fall, an old-fashioned scarecrow looks perfect propped in a chair next to the door. Stuff overalls and an old flannel shirt with straw, then add a stuffed and painted burlap head and an old straw hat. Whether you paint his features with a menacing or fun-loving expression, your scarecrow is at his best surrounded by fake fall leaves, straw, or pumpkins for an autumn touch.

Your porch is the first stop every visitor makes, so make sure they’re greeted by plenty of ghosts and ghouls this Halloween!

Dreamcatchers were originally made by the Native Americans. Although there are many versions produced by companies, the best way to get an original and authentic one is to buy from a Native American themselves, perhaps at a pow wow ceremony.

The legend behind the dreamcatcher is that they are believed to catch and preserve dreams. Native Americans of the Great Plains believed that the air is filled with good and bad dreams. The dreamcatchers are given to people who are cherished so that good dreams will follow them all their lives. It is believed that the woven web will catch your dreams in the night. The bad spirit dreams become tangled in the web and  disappear in the morning sun.  However, the good spirit dreams will sift through the center hole of the web
and float down the sacred feathers to bless the sleeping one with trouble free dreams.

Traditionally, the dreamcatchers were hung in the tipi or lodge and on a baby’s cradle board. But more modernly, they are hung in the doorway of the bedrooms.

The legend varies slightly from tribe to tribe, but all focus around this main point. Some believe that the dreamcatcher only works if made from supplies harvested from the earth, and not man-made items such as plastic. This is why it is probably better to get yours from places such as a pow wow or reservation rather than a mass-marketing store. But whether you want it to work and free you of your bad dreams or just want one for decoration is up to you!