If you and your family get really into Halloween, take the next step and make it a tradition to send spooky greeting cards to friends and family members near and far. Save the perfectly posed family portrait for your Christmas card, and have some fun for All Hallows’ Eve. Here are my top 5 favorite ideas for creating a Halloween card to remember. Costume Collage I have a hunch that most kids out there are a little like mine: they have that one thing in mind that they really want to be for Halloween, but they have somewhere between 12 and 40 other ideas for costumes. And between too-big costumes from last year, hand-me-downs and playtime favorites, we have a lot of dress-up clothes around the house. A few weeks before trick-or-treat night, have the kids do a dress rehearsal and take pictures of them in every costume they own. Snap action shots of them wielding light sabers, sprinkling fairy dust, and casting spells. If your child is on the fence about what to be for Halloween, your dress rehearsal might work out a few costume kinks and help clarify the big decision. They don’t need to know that you’re also acting as art director for your fabulous family Halloween card.
Family Portrait There’s nothing cuter than when the whole family gets behind one dress-up theme. From mom and dad as sushi chefs and baby as a little maki sushi roll to a family of Angry Birds, it’s a great way to promote family bonding and spirit. Even if everyone has different costumes, a family photo of everyone in their costume is a great basis for a Halloween greeting card. Or consider snapping a funny photo of the whole family in a darkish room pretending to be watching the scariest moment in a horror flick – faces awash with an eerie glow from the TV and feigned expressions to match what’s supposedly unfolding before your eyes.
Jack-O-Lantern Gallery Photograph the whole family carving pumpkins together. Show the process on one side and a gallery of the finished jack-o-lanterns on the other
Terrifying Treats Send out a recipe for your favorite creepy cocktail or ghastly treat. Include a picture so friends can conjure up an image of your concoction and fall under its spell.
Literary Macabre Message Snap a photo of the whole family reading horror tales by flashlight. Whether the whole family is reading from the same copy of Edgar Allen Poe’s collected works, or everyone’s reading their own age-appropriate books from The Shining to Where’s My Mummy?, it’s a scarily sweet moment to capture. Include your favorite passage from one or more of the books right on the card.
Happy Haunting!
