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by Cheryl DeBartolo The House Designers’ Contributing Writer
Halloween is tomorrow and with it come trick-or-treating visitors. Make your home the most visited house on the block by dressing up your home for the occasion. Whether you go for subtlety with a few pumpkins and scarecrows or you go all out with your decorations, here are a few helpful hints to inspire you. While you are decorating, take a moment to enter our Halloween Photo Contest through Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and show us your spooky entryways, window displays, porches and patios.
Paint Your Door
A paintable door is a subtle way to change your home’s exterior and to get your porch ready for Halloween. You can easily change the color of a door with a paintable surface. If you paint your door a solid color it can serve as a canvas for other decorations including wreaths and wall clings.
One of our favorite paintable doors is the Therma-Tru® Classic-Craft® Canvas-Collection™. With all the benefits of fiberglass including security, durability, and energy efficiency, it is also a smooth paintable surface that features beautiful, architecturally correct facets and rich embossing that rivals high-end custom doors. There is no doubt that you can find a Classic-Craft® Canvas Collection™ door that fits your tastes and style, and can be your canvas for years to come.
Make Sure You Have Good Lighting
Lighting is a key element to any good landscape but it is especially important on Halloween. A well-lit path will guide trick-or-treaters to your doorway and minimize the risk of injury. Good lighting doesn’t have to be Halloween themed, in fact you can achieve great Halloween lighting simply by picking outdoor light fixtures you love already.
For example, heavily ornamented European fixtures look great all year around but tend to lean towards a more Gothic, horror movie feel when accented with other Halloween decorations. You can find both wall lights and landscape lights at LAMPS PLUS®.
Use What You Have Around the House
Decorating for Halloween doesn’t have to be an expense. There are plenty of easy DIY decorations that you can craft and place to accent your own home. You can create ghosts to hang in the trees around your home, or create a scarecrow out of used clothing to sit on your front porch.
You can also purchase pumpkins and create unique focal points. If you choose to do so, you can carve the pumpkins and make jack-o-lanterns. You can even group your jack-o-lanterns together in order to create a pumpkin fire pit with the accent of a few logs. Using flameless candles is a great way to make sure that you maintain the ambiance while keeping the fire lit.
Don’t Forget to Enter Our Halloween Contest
After putting the finishing touches on your Halloween landscape, snap a pic, and share it with us on Twitter or Instagram using the hashtag #THDHauntedMansion for a chance to win a $100 Home Depot gift card. You can also enter by sharing your entry on our Facebook page. Visit our blog for more details.
