I have a confession. I do not like Halloween. Never have. When I was a kid, I occasionally liked planning out my costume, but I absolutely dreaded going door to door and telling a joke in exchange for candy. I don’t like decorating with witches, ghosts, jack-o-lanterns, monsters, and spiders. For the life of me, I have never understood why some people put more time and energy into decorating their house all spooky and scary for Halloween than they do making it all cheery and joyful for Christmas. Call me a stick in the mud, but it’s just not my thing.
Needless to say, because of my feelings toward this upcoming holiday, I am definitely no expert in hosting a Halloween party. Until last week I have never done it. In fact, I probably haven’t done anything to celebrate Halloween in over 10 years. But for some reason, this year, I just thought it *might* be a little bit fun to have a little party. I really don’t know what got into me. I decided to host a costume party for some of our married friends. (For some reason it seemed much more appealing to me to host/attend a party in costume when everyone has a spouse that you could have a coordinating costume with. When I was single there was no way I would have shown up at a costume party by myself!)
Anywho, I just thought it would be fun to show you what we did for our little get-together! It was very low-key and super easy to host! (My kind of party.) There’s still almost two weeks until Halloween, so if you decide you’d like to host a little party, you could easily throw together something like this!
First off, I had to plan our costumes. This was the first time we’ve ever dressed up for Halloween together. I wanted something that went together and I wanted to include Wilma. The very first thing I thought of was a Scooby-Doo theme, and it seemed so easy to do, so that’s what we went with! I made a collar for Wilma using a blue collar and some blue and yellow foam sheets. You can’t see it in the photo, but I also put “S D” stickers on the dog tag. Alex went as Shaggy. He already owned a green t-shirt and tan pants, plus he hasn’t had a haircut in quite a while, so his costume was easy. I went as Velma. I already owned the red skirt, so I just snagged this orange sweater from Goodwill and threw on some glasses. I couldn’t find any knee-high orange socks, but I had these tall burgundy boots and I think it got the point across.
I decided to do a taco bar for the food. This was so simple and made it very hands-off during the party. We had pre-cooked the ground beef and put it in the crockpot to keep it warm. So when it was time to eat, I just set out some topping and let everyone go at it!
For dessert, Alex requested his favorite peanut butter cookies. I decided to have a bit of fun and placed the chocolate Kisses in upside down and then drew little legs with melted chocolate to make them look like spiders. It was a super easy way to add some Halloween vibes to the party.
I also made caramel apples because that just seemed like Halloween food to me. However, my caramel apple making skills need some definite improvement! We shared many laughs over how incredibly impossible they were to eat because my caramel was so sticky and hard. In hindsight, I would have kept some caramel warm in a crockpot or fondue pot and had sliced apples to dip. It would have worked much better I think, but these caramel apples definitely added to the entertainment for the night!
For drinks, I was inspired by these mocktails I originally saw on Tanner Mann’s Instagram. I based my drinks off of this, but I used this recipe. I left the vodka out, and let guests just add some vodka into their drink if they wished. They ended up so cute! I found the vampire teeth at the Dollar Tree. I also used Haribo Sour Streamers instead of the Air Heads. They were tasty and super cute and fun!
I only did a few decorations, like the “Happy Halloween” banner over the taco bar, but what I did do, I got from the Dollar Tree, including the plates, and napkins. I had also bought these cute little Halloween bags for a costume contest. I got one to put the votes in and the other I filled with stuff for a scary movie night at home. A scary movie, popcorn, candy, and a candle. We didn’t end up actually doing a costume contest at our party, but I thought it was a cute idea.
We ended our night by watching “Halloween Kills” which we were able to stream through Peacock TV, which was super convenient and a great way to end the night!
It ended up being a really fun night and I’m ultimately glad that I decided to celebrate Halloween this year. Are you hosting a Halloween party this year? I would love to hear what you’re doing to celebrate and what your costume is!