# Ceiling Decorations



## HereForTheBoose (Aug 21, 2016)

For budget ideas, you can find one of those 15-20 foot spiders that are made out of trash bag material and hang it from the center of the ceiling fan then hang the legs at each corner of the room.

I'm a fan of covering ceiling fixtures with those cheap stretchable spider webs using Command hooks. I've had good results using the tiny clear ones meant for string lights except hooking ends of the web to that then moving to the other side of the room to stretch it over your entire space. This requires you put a hook every maybe 2-4 feet along all four sides of the room.

Really stretch it out for best results. If you stretch too much and get parts sagging down in the middle of your room, sometimes this looks good but if it doesn't, just open another bag and stretch it right under the first try. Building up layers helps hide the ceiling and looks creepier.

Another variation would be to first hang some red string lights as high as you can then stretch the web below them. In the dark the lights will cast a great red glow on the web and it'll look like you have a demonic storm hovering over the party.


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## lilibat (Aug 10, 2015)

Light weight fabric draped from a pvc pipe at the apex of the ceiling to the tops of the walls.


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## hllwnfan (Aug 18, 2009)

Spider webs. Easy and cheap. Add a few spiders as well.


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## vwgirl (Jul 16, 2012)

Fire and Ice spot lights placed in hidden areas. This would add color along with effect. I use them in my living room, which has basic ceiling, but get lots of compliments.


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## krnlmustrd (Oct 14, 2010)

I like the fire and ice idea too. I also have a bunch of those vaulted ceilings so I bought four of the whirl-a-motion spider projection effects to use this year. One is definitely not enough, but I think 4 might give good coverage for one room. Here's a review I did that shows one in action:


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## Kwll2112 (Sep 14, 2016)

I think lights would be the easiest to do. Colored washes of light will change the appearance of the room. If you put small silhouettes in front of the lights, they'd project large shadows on the ceiling.


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## Kwll2112 (Sep 14, 2016)

Other thoughts:

Spiders:








Paper bats (simple, but effective at breaking up a plain ceiling):








Candles:









It's more work to hang stuff like this from the ceilings, but the effects are well received.


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## Stochey (Sep 22, 2009)

Kwll2112, those pictures are glorious! What did you use to attach the spiders?


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## Kwll2112 (Sep 14, 2016)

Stochey said:


> Kwll2112, those pictures are glorious! What did you use to attach the spiders?


Thanks!

We used black thumbtacks. The small and medium spiders only needed 3 or 4 legs tacked for them to stay, but the larger ones sometimes needed 6 legs tacked down. Even though they were glossy, the black tacks worked great, as the spider "fur" hid most of it and the color blended into the spider. The giant spider in the corner (bought from Costco) needed a hook in the ceiling to hang, as it's way too heavy for tacks.

We had the spiders in the kitchen for 2015, but last year we had them in the front room (pics below). A friend of ours who's really good with webs set up the webbing. We got a lot of "eeewwwws" and "I hate spiders" when people saw the room.

















The same big spider is in the corner of the first pic, just to give it some perspective.


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## Eviejenn (Aug 10, 2014)

If you're going for a haunted house look, you could make "holes" where the plaster has fallen away and revealed the lathe underneath. Basically, you cut the "hole" out of black poster board and add strips of wood grained contact paper for the lath and blur the edges with gesso or white paint. I found a tutorial online last year and it was cheap, effective, and relatively simple.


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## HereForTheBoose (Aug 21, 2016)

Any tips on hanging the fabric on the chandeliers? I'd love to do that this year and stick in some spray painted twigs. Did you use cheesecloth gauze or heavier creepy cloth?


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## dbruner (Aug 23, 2012)

That looks awesome!


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## avgjoefriday (Aug 8, 2016)

Hi! Like you I always need or want to do something to the ceiling and for lighting. One year I went ahead and purchased a floor lamp from Lowes and removed the shades, then used some of these Fire and ice bulbs. Luckily I have a electrical outlet in the floor in my living room so I was able to somewhat center it in the room. Pics to follow. I did a more elaborate one the year before using an outdoor planter and lantern pole from Big Lots. 



















The top of this had four lights pointing upwards out of a dark brown pit. The solar lanterns I replaced with bats and the bottom basket I put dead looking flowers in. 











Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## Kwll2112 (Sep 14, 2016)

Eviejenn said:


> If you're going for a haunted house look, you could make "holes" where the plaster has fallen away and revealed the lathe underneath. Basically, you cut the "hole" out of black poster board and add strips of wood grained contact paper for the lath and blur the edges with gesso or white paint. I found a tutorial online last year and it was cheap, effective, and relatively simple.


I like this idea. Do you have any pictures of this or a link to the tutorial?


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## Kwll2112 (Sep 14, 2016)

HereForTheBoose said:


> Any tips on hanging the fabric on the chandeliers? I'd love to do that this year and stick in some spray painted twigs. Did you use cheesecloth gauze or heavier creepy cloth?


We bought a large amount of low thread count muslin (cheesecloth). We found the looser weave was easier to rip and tear and looked better in place. You can see this on the chandeliers in the pics I posted on page 1 of this thread. 

The bolt of cloth we got was something like 100 yards or so. We just cut the length we want and rip/tear it apart to get the look we want.


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## HereForTheBoose (Aug 21, 2016)

Ah, thanks for the warning about the materials needed. I was going to pick up a few packs of Dollar Store creepy cloth but sounds like I should consider a fabric bolt.


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## Kwll2112 (Sep 14, 2016)

HereForTheBoose said:


> Ah, thanks for the warning about the materials needed. I was going to pick up a few packs of Dollar Store creepy cloth but sounds like I should consider a fabric bolt.


Oh, sorry, I didn't mean for it to sound like you needed a whole bolt of fabric! That's just what we bought, thinking we'd be using a lot of the stuff in decorations in general.

You could use the stuff you get from the dollar store, it's pretty good. It's a much more loose weave than muslin, but I think it would work. My issue with the dollar store is you don't get all that much. I realize it's only a dollar, but you can see the price margins.


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## HereForTheBoose (Aug 21, 2016)

Definitely true about the price margins. The dollar store is fantastic for certain things and others you'd be saving if you shelled out for bulk quantities elsewhere. I do love how layered yours turned out so I need to do a search for maybe only 25-30 yrds.


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## Kwll2112 (Sep 14, 2016)

HereForTheBoose said:


> Definitely true about the price margins. The dollar store is fantastic for certain things and others you'd be saving if you shelled out for bulk quantities elsewhere. I do love how layered yours turned out so I need to do a search for maybe only 25-30 yrds.


Not sure the look you're going for, but maybe this will help you visualize it. The first year, we just did the bottom and looking back on the pictures, I don't think it turned out all that good:









The following years we went father up the chain and I think the look was better:









We didn't have the height, so were limited on how far the fabric could hang down. I think it would have ben better for it to be longer, but then people would have been walking through it.


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## HereForTheBoose (Aug 21, 2016)

The chandeliers we have are SO not Halloweeny so I do plan on covering up to the chain like you guys did and poking the lightbulbs through some pieces so their bases are covered. They both hang over a table so it's a neat suggestion to consider having the fabric drape over the centerpiece. Maybe I can have it touching the tabletop and position an 18" skeleton peeking through the tattered cloth.

As for the fake wall hole tutorial that Evie mentioned, I think this one gives some additional details but isn't too thorough: http://www.hauntforum.com/showthread.php?t=10217&highlight=plaster

Unfortunately the pictures aren't showing up there for me but you can see them archived on Google Images if you search for "Halloween fake wall holes."


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## chocolatemice (May 2, 2014)

Kwll2112 said:


> I like this idea. Do you have any pictures of this or a link to the tutorial?


Not the person who suggested it, and I don't know where that tutorial is, but I did something similar for my 2013 party. You can see a pic or two here - 

http://www.halloweenforum.com/members/chocolatemice-albums-2013-the-haunted-garret.html

I bought some black poster board and a roll of wood grain contact paper from the Dollar Store. I ripped the black poster board into irregular shapes, trying to vary the appearances so it would look more natural. I found that 6" to 15" wide and 15" to 25" long looked the best on my walls and gave me the most bang for my buck- any smaller and it looked a little silly. (My party pics show some of the variations in shape & dimension I tried - I think the final pic in the album shows the most successful style) I don't remember precisely how wide I cut the contact paper, but I think they were roughly 1 1/2" or 2" wide strips. 

I then applied them to the wall with regular scotch tape rolled into tubes on the back. I'm a renter and have had bad experiences with double sided tape and contact putty, so I went with cheap and easy to remove - they survived on the wall for several days without falling and didn't remove any paint. 

It's not much of a tutorial, but I hope that helps!


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