I'd sent out the invites, I'd badgered my friends incessantly to come, now it was time to decorate!
Since we have such a beautiful living room space, I really wanted to make that the key space of the party, so I decided to contain the entire event within that room alone. This created some interesting opportunity/challenges. For one, at most house parties, people congregate around the kitchen. I needed a way to mark the kitchen as a non party zone. To make this happen I came up with what ended up being my favorite dramatic touch. I made the dining space in front of the kitchen into an dramatic entry space. As guests arrived, they came up the stairs and were immediately in a field of floating, glowing pumpkins. I had to make this area dark to discourage loitering, so I hung black table cloths to close out the light coming from the living room. It worked like a charm, and I loved the scene it created!
People always congregate near the food or alcohol tables, so I used that to help spread people throughout the space. I placed a food table on one side of the room and a drinks table on the other. On drinks table, I'd arranged a skeleton, some cobwebs, and the drinks. A bright down light helped pump up the drama of this setting as well.
Most house parties are (for me) nothing more than a marathon of small talk. While Halloween provides some good conversation, I still wanted to offer my guests a few activities. First on that list was a pinata smash, and what could be more appropriate than to smash a pumpkin. We moved the scaffolding across the room and I made a very nerve racking climb up to hang a hook and line for the pinata.
I also never cared for the traditional pinata approach. I'm too impatient to wait while someone else flails around with a blindfold. Instead I wanted everyone in on the action, so I gathered them in a large circle, handed out copper pipes, and repeatedly instructed them not to hit one another. I started the pumpkin swinging in a wide circle and let my inebriated guests do the rest. It is truly a miracle that no one got injured in any of this!
I was completely prepared to take the scaffolding apart for the party, but my roommates had a better idea: photo booth! A few well placed table cloths, and a prop owl (thanks dollar store!) and we had a photo booth! Well... not quite a photo booth, because I don't have a tripod for my camera, so we improvised and called it a selfie booth. I was honestly a little skeptical about the booth being used at first, but to my surprise it was quite a popular attraction.
I left much of the food preparations to my roommates, but I did take on a punch recipe. Rather than some sickly sweet blast from my college past, I wanted something a little more balanced. To find it, I had to stop searching for "Halloween punches" and went with a traditional recipe with tea (rooibos in this case, so people wouldn't be kept up late by caffeine.) There was also no sugar, so to add some sweetness as well as holiday flair. I carved heads out of apples, and let them soak in the brandy for the entire day prior.
Last, but not least. I had a projector and speaker set up. When it comes to halloween, there's really no such thing as going overboard. I spent every evening last week scouring youtube for good clips. I had some basic criteria: spooky video, musical audio. I didn't go too gory and I didn't play the music too loud, because I hate when I can't hear myself talk at parties. I think I found the right balance. Here's the final playlist in all it's glory.
Most of the feedback I've had was pretty positive, and I think for the most part it was successful. Given all the work that went into it, I'm glad it's behind me now. Happy Halloween!