Halloween Decorations!!

Hello and happy October barbies!

Here at the BDH, we couldn't have been more excited to welcome the spooky season the best way we know how: with Halloween decorations! We had a ton already but one thing we were missing was a mailbox swag. Believe it or not, we didn't have a mailbox at our Houston rental house. The whole subdivision shared community mailboxes. So now that we have our own real mailbox, I was eager to adorn it. I'll walk you through instructions so you can DIY your own mailbox swag at the end of this post. Until then, here are some of the spookiest photos from around the BDH!

 

Here's my 7 ft black and orange Halloween tree! Over the years my love has Christmas has kind of leached into other holidays (I also have a 7 ft pink Valentine's day tree covered in Hearts, a Mardi Gras tree covered in beads and masks and a 7 ft white 4th of July tree covered in red, white, blue and stars). This year I've covered it in skeletons, ghosts, ceramic purple witches, pumpkins (of course), a giant creepy eye and some orange glittery spiders. Oh, and of course I top it off with a a candy corn hat, duh. The lace pumpkins around the bottom are DIY projects from several years ago.

I always love to pull out my two-tier spider web server.

 

Halloween bathroom (the rat keeps freaking out hubby, which makes me laugh):

Halloween chandelier. I only had a few of the pumpkin lanterns, but luckily mom bought a ton more last year when they were on clearance. This weekend she's going to bring me hers that she's not using so that I can have one on each prong. I also hung a glittery spider from the center.

 

 Spiders and a glitter pumpkin:

 Front porch with hard to see Halloween wreaths and little scarecrows in the planters

 Halloween wreaths! I DIY'd these two years ago.

 Halloween deco mesh DIY wreaths again:

 Scarecrows at the bistro table and Halloween garden stakes:

I got a ton of these pumpkin picks from the dollar store (!!) so I added them to all of my flower arrangements around the house.

 Glitter pumpkins are my current obsession

 

Bats, cats and pumpkins in the foyer:

 Ledge witch

 I know this was also featured in my fall decor post, but I couldn't resist adding it here too.

Skulls and Crate and Barrel spider cupcake holders in the dining room:

Mark Roberts Halloween fairy from my always trendy mother-in-law who collects them:

 More glitter pumpkins. Swoon.

A childhood heirloom, this pumpkin guy was part of all of my childhood Halloweens. It proudly stood in the doorway at the house in Bahama, NC I grew up in every October. Mom said I could put it up this year and I'm taking the responsibility pretty seriously.

 Spider web rug a la Target's dollar spot.

 And you guys know I love my Prissy Plates - here's the Halloween edition!

Can't forget the DIY deco mesh mailbox swag! Here's what you'll need:

1. Deco mesh - you can get it at Hobby Lobby, Michaels, Carolina Pottery or even Walmart sometimes (way less than a roll - maybe 1/4 a roll at most)(I used about 1/8 of two different rolls - the black roll isn't pictured here)
2. Mesh ribbon (the orange stuff) - available at the same stores
3. Accent ribbon - available at any craft store and also Walmart
4. Pipe Cleaners
5. Scissors
6. I added the white mesh roping for extra pizazz, but it's totally not necessary

First, unroll and cut two strips of about 4-8 feet of mesh, depending on how long you want the swag to drape over your mailbox. I cut one strip of black and one strip of orange and black. Line the two strips up, and pinch them at about 8 inches from the bottom.

Cut your pipe cleaners into halves or thirds and use the pipe cleaner to tie off where you pinched the two mesh strips.

Proceed  every 8 inches or so until your strips of mesh look like a catepillar and are pinched in roughly equal sized sections from end to end. If you want your swag to be symmetrical, make sure you do an even number of sections.

 

 I went back and added the mesh tubing because I had it laying around, but I don't think it was necessary.

The last step is to add the bow in the middle most pinched spot (assuming you want the swag symmetrical). I added an orange mesh bow and then a second bow on top of that with my accent ribbon. I left my bow tails/legs really long for added drama, but you certainly don't have to if you like a neater, cleaner look. And voila! Here's the finished product:

Isn't the foggy morning appropriate for this Halloween post? I wish I could give a cost for this project, but I had all of my materials leftover as scraps from previous projects. For me, it probably cost no more than $7 in materials, but if you had to go out and buy it all new it could be as much as $20, but you would have a lot of stuff left over.

As an added bonus and despite their complete irrelevance to this blog post, here are some good lawyer cartoons, two of my favorite outfits from the last week and a new pic of the BDH. Thanks for reading barbs! You guys are the best!

xox!


Submitted to:
http://www.creationsbykara.com
 http://www.savvysouthernstyle.net/

Fall Decorating at the BDH!

Hello barbie dolls!

I sure hope you're enjoying fall as much as I am. At the BDH we've certainly gone overboard, with this being our first decoratable (I just made that word up - decoratable - adjective : a season that one can really decorate for) season since moving into the BDH. I love summer as much as any girl, but lets be honest, there's not much you can do for it in the decorating realm. A couple bright colors and prints here, an American flag there, but that's about it. Fall, on the other hand, is a season where a girl with a new house can go off the deep end with pumpkins, earth tones, raffia, mums, leaves and burlap... and this girl has done just that.

At the risk of making the BDH look like this excessive pumpkin palace, I've been putting touches of fall virtually everywhere.

Here are a few of my favorite fall things from around the BDH:

I've also been indulging my love for fall via burning pumpkin roll scentsy in every scentsy warmer in my house for two weeks straight. Last Saturday we also invited my parents and grandma over for chili (vegetarian and non-vegetarian - thanks for the recipe Ranita!) and pumpkin bread.

To those of you interested in jazzing up your own dream houses for fall, here are a few inspiration photos from some other fab fall-lovers. I'm absolutely OBSESSED with the pumpkin place settings. You could even cricut on your monogram or that of the guest who will be sitting there. Adorbs.

This weekend I'll probably pull out our seven tubs of Halloween stuff! The giant spiders, bats and skeletons have a tendency to freak me out, especially when I'm up in the middle of the night and forget they're there, but I guess that's what Halloween is all about

Aside from fall, here are some other things I'm really feeling these days:

Prints on prints on prints, also known as "power clashing" makes me swoon.  It takes a lot of skill to execute it well, but this decorator definitely did.

I'm in love with this burlap bow pillow. Seems like it could be DIY'd pretty easily.

I run into this photo on the web constantly, but it never gets old. Love everything about this, especially the striped wallpaper. Hubby and I will be wallpapering the formal living room in pink stripes this week/weekend. We're major wallpaper rookies so wish us luck!

Of course I adore this chevron and burlap frame. Again, it could be easily DIY'd. Could be a good Christmas gift for the gal pals.

I'm in LOVE with my Maybelline Color Sensational lipstick in Pink and Proper. It's probably not appropriate for fall, but I can't help myself.

I bought this tunic from Target of all places this weekend and I'm obsessed. I'm wearing it with black tights, tan boots and a tan scarf. This picture totally doesn't do it justice, but its gorgeous. The sleeves are sheer with buttons at the wrists. LOVE.

Lastly, I'm loving my weekend breakfasts on the back porch with hubby and our pups. This fall weather is so nice, especially in the mornings, that I feel awful not being outdoors (and that says a lot coming from someone as not-outdoorsy as me).

As a parting gift, here are some fab photos of fall for you barbs! Enjoy whatever you love about the season, from the pumpkin lattes, to the boots and scarves to the 10,000 pumpkins you want to adorn your house with (notwithstanding your husband's objections). xox!