Centerpieces for Your Halloween Table

Hello to all and welcome to another blog post on The Artistry!

Today we are talking about a really fun holiday: Halloween! I know many of us wait all year to put the spooky decorations up, spend months designing and making costumes, and choosing just the right type (and amount) of candy.

Halloween is a concept that wasn’t around in my childhood. My country didn’t really celebrate it at the time, but Hollywood movies brought this celebration closer and closer to us, and now there are many places that do trick or treat and decorate houses. The kids in my neighborhood always show up to get candy and I always have decorations to show them that my house is in on the fun.

One of the things people like to do around here is to have Halloween parties as well. My sister-in-law’s birthday is on October 31st and she’s had a few birthday parties with a witch theme (Halloween has been called “Day of the Witches” here for some time). Many people like to get together with friends to dance, eat and drink in a spooky setting just for fun (and maybe use it as an excuse to dress as their favorite characters).

If you are having a party, or maybe you just want something nice and creative to decorate your house this Halloween, check out these two centerpieces that will certainly be the center of attention! They can be used on the main/food table or for individual tables if you’re having a bigger celebration. I hope you enjoy these ideas!

Cauldron

This piece was so fun and easy to make, and also looks really good on the table. It fills the space nicely and it’s a funny decoration as well. This is the design used.

The cauldron itself has 18 pieces. It’s so easy to assemble. You just glue the side panels side-by-side, then add the bottom layers, one from the inside and one from the outside. You can glue the panels to the bottom as you go or at the end, whatever you feel most comfortable with. The assembly directions recommend gluing the panels first, then the inside part of the bottom layer, then the outside part.

You can use the same black cardstock for all the pieces or you can choose a patterned paper for the decorative panels. I cut them in cardstock and embossed them one by one. It isn’t as noticeable from afar, but when you get close to it, the details are really beautiful. I used two different embossing folders, one with tiny bubbles and another with different-sized circles. I then alternated the panels when I glued them on. The details can be seen in the close-up picture.

The upside-down legs come with a double layer, so it looks the same from the front and back. I used print-and-cut for them and added a thin outline because it’s more my style, but you absolutely don’t have to do that. The design comes with two different sets of legs. You can also cut them in cardstock layers, which I’m sure will give a beautiful result.

I used shredded green cellophane paper to fill the cauldron, to improvise a witch’s brew, but you can also fill it with treats. The kids are going to love it!

The design also has a funny (and punny) tag to go with it and two toads, but I decided not to use them. I got some fire designs I had here, used print-and-cut on them, and put them on the bottom of the cauldron, to make it look like it’s hot and bubbling. I kept it simple, but you can make the most of it and use everything that comes with the design. The bundle also has St. Patrick’s Day pieces to turn your witch cauldron into a pot of gold!

Witch

I’m going to be honest here, this one was not an easy piece for me to do. There are so many pieces and they don’t come in the same size, you have to resize everything to the sizes stated on the PDF before cutting, which took me a while to get just right. There are instructions on how to assemble, which helped a little, but this was still infinitely harder to cut and assemble than the cauldron design. It does have more parts and they are more intricate than the first design, so it was a given.

When I chose this project, I didn’t realize it would have this many parts. There are A LOT of them (as you can see in the image below). That said, it looks amazing on the table! It’s a beautiful and detailed design and the result makes it worth it. The hat comes off and inside there are treats for those who are brave enough to try and mess with the angry witch! Just make sure you start early, this isn’t a last-minute project, especially if you don’t have that much time in your week for crafting.

The hat panels are very thin pieces, so I don’t know if embossing them would give the best results. I almost did that to match the other project but decided to just leave it black. The pictures on the tutorial that comes with the design show the hat panels cut in a purple patterned paper and the band in black. I chose to do the opposite, black for the hat and a purple band, although mine doesn’t have the cute pattern on it, I used plain cardstock.

You can also make your hat shiny. For that, you just need to spray a little varnish on it. If you choose to do it, make sure the type of varnish you’re using is meant to be used on paper. It should have something written on the spray can. You can even use glitter paper which would look amazing as well, or you can do what I did and just leave it black, the same as the base. The design has enough elements to make it special as it is.

For the hair, when you cut the pieces, they are a little flat. You can change that with a pencil. What you need to do is slightly press the piece between the pencil and your thumb (or any surface) and pull the paper. This will give it a more curly look and it makes a total difference, as you can see in the picture:

I have to admit, I did cut the eyes bigger than I should have. It was a miscalculation, but I kinda liked the way it turned out, so I left it like that anyway. And the witch is ready to hunt my candy table! By the way, this is the design I used, it’s a set with the two Wicked Witches.

What are you making for Halloween this year? Decorations, costumes, cards? Maybe all of it? Whatever it is, I hope you have as much fun as I had planning my Halloween crafts as well!