Guru Goddess

Q. How can I save money on Halloween decorations?

A. Let your children participate in the decorating. Buy craft paper in a variety of colors and help each child create their own decorations. Create leaves, pumpkins and other seasonal items in various appropriate colors. (Hint: You can keep these kinds of decorations around the house right the way through to Thanksgiving.)

Also let them make some more scary ones, ghosts, zombies, witches and so on.

Tape them into the windows or mount them on the fridge door our your outer door. You can cover the ones on the outer door with plastic film to protect them from the wind and rain. For example, using just plain white computer paper, your kid could make a huge life-sized skeleton for your door.

Go online to some homeschooling or teachers’ resources sites to download free coloring sheets and more. You don’t have to go the expensive route for excellent Halloween decorations. Let the kids use their imaginations, and keep the pumpkins and leaves for Thanksgiving. Save the more spooky items for next year and they can be keepsakes for years to come.

Q. How can I make cheap Halloween costumes?

A. Use what you already have in the house as much as you possibly can to avoid having to spend a lot on costumes every Halloween. Let’s face it, the children grow every year, but in most cases your budget doesn’t, so start with anything that your children might have used last year and pass along or freshen up the costumes as ‘hand-me-downs’.

In many cases you can easily add bits or take them away to modify or create a whole new look.. For instance, a pirate costume one year can be a three Musketeers costume the next. A black witch costume one year can be a black cat costume the next. You may still need to buy a few accessories, colored felt, fabric, face paint, headbands and the like, but this will still greatly reduce the costs of your Halloween costumes.

Also consider getting patterns online and using fabric remnants. A vampire, witch’s or magicians cape with appropriate clothing underneath (a white shirt and black pants or a dark colored dress) is simple and fun to make. Then all you need are fangs, a broom stick or a magic wand. You can keep the cloak for years for other costumes or hand-me-downs.

Q. How can I save money on the things I do need to buy for Halloween?

A. Avoid the fancy Halloween party stores and opt for other options instead. You can buy Halloween decorations through Goodwill and similar secondhand stores. Halloween decorations and certain costume elements can easily be purchased inexpensively secondhand and, when you are done using them, you can donate them back to these stores to pass the savings on to someone else. You can also get a receipt for your donation from the Salvation Army and take the deduction on your taxes next April. Check their website for the value they allow for each item you donate and be sure to get a receipt from them for everything you bring.

Another way to save big is to check out 99 cent stores. They often have cheap decorations, paper goods and coloring books and activity books with holiday themes that your kids can use for decorations, placements, costume ideas and patterns, and more.

Check Pier 1 as soon as the season is over and save up to 90% off on any leftovers of their holiday line. Then put them away until next year.

Q. How do I save money on candy at Halloween?

A. Candy prices go up during the last couple of weeks of October because everything adopts the Halloween packaging and is sold specifically for this purpose. Beat the price jump by buying your candy a couple of weeks before the big rush. Store your candy in a cool, dry place, so it’s fresh when it’s time to use it. To save big, shop the sales after the holidays and buy anything that is not specially packaged for Halloween. This candy will do just fine for the Christmas holidays and can be up to 90% off the list price. If it is orange and other fall colors, it will probably do just fine for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Halloween has become a huge holiday in the United States. If you want to get into the holiday spirit without spending a fortune, shop smart and try a bit of DIY and enjoy the sense of accomplishment that you and your children will experience in having a do it yourself Halloween.

FURTHER READING

YOUR RECESSION SURVIVAL GUIDE: How to Save Money and Even Boost Your Income in This Recession

Dressing up in costume for Halloween is one of the most enjoyable parts of the month of October, but costumes can be expensive to purchase. This is especially true when you’re purchasing for several children at the same time. Kids’ costumes can add up quickly in price, but you can save a significant amount of money by either re-using the ones that you bought last year, or creating your own.

Re-use the costumes from last year
If your children are the same gender and similar in age, pass along the costume to the next child. If the costume has parts to it that can be used, by all means do so. For example, a black cape can be great for a vampire, witch, warlock or magician. A red dress can be great for a vampire, Little Red Riding Hood, Snow White with the addition of a white apron, Heidi with the addition of a white pinafore, a salsa dancer with the addition of some multicolored ruffles at the hem and some maracas, and so on.

Make Your Own

If you need to start from scratch because nothing fits or you already got rid of it or gave it away to a charity shop (a great source of cheap costumes, then try creating one of these frugal and fun costume ideas for your kids this year:

1. Weatherman (or Weathergirl).
If your child already has rain gear, such as a yellow jacket and rain boots, you can easily add to this attire for a creative costume. Outfit a large umbrella with craft paper lightning bolts and raindrops or snowflakes strung up on fishing line. This simple costume is super cute and very cheap to make.
Many “occupational” costumes are simple to make using materials you already have in your home. You may need to buy a costume hardhat to finish off a carpenter or construction costume, for example, but the cost is much lower when you can use your own blue jeans/carpenter’s jeans, flannel shirt and tool belt from home. For a policeman costume, you would need a blue shirt, dark trousers and a badge or emblem such as NYPD.

2. Crayon.
This is another fun costume you can make with things you may already have. Take a solid color shirt and pant set and adhesive-backed felt. Create “CRAYON” or a color label with black felt. Make accents for the wrists and ankles that coordinate with a typical “Crayola.” Finally, top it off with a pointed party hat in a coordinated color for the perfect sharpened tip on your crayon. You can also roll them in a craft paper tube in the appropriate color with CRAYON written on it, and the hat. Hold up the crayon roll with shoulder straps made out of the craft paper or a couple of matching socks stapled to the paper.

3. Animal costumes.
Animal costumes are easy to make, beginning with a leotard or a single-colored outfit and a coordinating fabric or felt. Attach ears to a headband, and create a tail that you can safety-pin to the waistband. A little face paint goes a long way, but doesn’t cost much to acquire. Dogs and cats work well as quick animal costume ideas.

Get more creative with lizards, birds and other animal costumes depending on what materials you have at hand. Ear headbands and various animal headpieces can be found in a party store but are easy to make. For young children, you can striped or fluffy fabric to turn your child into a lion or tiger. You can find free patterns online that will help you judge just how much fabric and trim you will need.

With enough planning, you can create your own costumes quickly and easily, often with items that you already have at home. This will allow your children to get the most out of their Halloween experience without forcing you to spend more than you can afford.
Halloween is now an important holiday that many schools participate in, with parties, costume parades, bakes goods and more. Your child will not want to be left out, but luckily you can get them a great costume if you refurbish last year’s, shop at a charity store for one, or make your own at home.

Further Reading
YOUR RECESSION SURVIVAL GUIDE: How to Save Money and Even Boost Your Income in This Recession

Smart Spending Strategies

Trying to convince young ones of how great it is to send their candy to someone else is no easy task. However, if you let them know the dentist is offering to pay them for their goods, they may be more compromising. Personally, I thought of giving the money back to the dentist in order to help with the shipping cost. My seven year old was not so agreeable.

After my son went through his candy for a couple of days, on November 2^nd we went down to our dentist’s office for our first buy back. It felt good knowing that the troops were being treated; my son was making a little cash and we were doing more to help prevent cavities as well.

Operation Gratitude, a nonprofit organization out of California, distributes the candy to soldiers and I attempted to talk my son into splitting the amount of money he received for his candy. After a bit of coercing and explaining to him why this was such as good idea, he finally agreed.  

If you’re interested in participating in the candy buy back for soldiers, ask your dentist or look for a dentist in your area that takes part in this program. Eat up soldiers and thank you!

While our U.S. soldiers are overseas serving our country, dentists all over America are participating in a buyback program that treats our soldiers while trying to prevent cavities in our little ones.

Children trample all over the neighborhoods, visit their friends and family on Halloween all in hopes of coming hope with the lots of yum-yum gooey sugar. They dump the candy out on the floor or table and begin to go through the candy piece by piece. They pick out what they really like and for the most part, the rest goes into a bowl and sits there for several months until mom finally dumps it into the garbage.

This magnificent mound of candy is not seen as glorious by any dentist. Dentists see tooth decay and unnecessary trips to their office for children instead. Of course brushing and flossing is the biggest prevention of tooth decay but the less sweets you eat the less chance you have of developing tooth decay. This nightmarish vision sparked within dentists everywhere to come up with the candy buyback program.

I became aware of this program last October when I got a notice from our dentist’s office. They would buy back any candy that we didn’t want from our Halloween take-home at a dollar a pound. The intent was not to rob the children of their childhood Halloween memory but to let them have a choice of what they wanted to sell back. What a deal! They explained that they would then send the goodies we sold them overseas to our soldiers.

Movement

One of the most fun activities that a group can participate in at a Halloween party is Freeze Dancing.  An adult operates a portable CD player containing a Halloween song CD.  The children dance to the music until the music stops.

At that point, each child has to freeze in the position they were in when the music stopped.  Anyone who moves even a little is eliminated from the next round.  The last child standing wins.

Using these ideas for Group Halloween Parties, your party is sure to be a success.