The Bats Are Just Paper and She Has Made Forty of Them
She found the black paper in the drawer on the first of October. There are now bats on the stairs, on the fridge, and one on the cat.
This is the good version of Halloween decorating, and it costs almost nothing. The decorations a child makes get put up with more care than anything you buy, they stay up because she is watching, and the making is the bit she remembers. What follows is sorted by how much of it you have to do yourself, which is the only sorting that matters in October.
The three that need nothing but what is in the drawer
Bats first. Fold a sheet of black paper in half, cut a rough wing shape along the fold, open it out. Every one comes out different and none of them can be wrong, which is exactly why a child will make forty.
Tissue ghosts next. A white tissue over a lollipop or a ball of scrunched paper, a bit of thread round the neck, two dots for eyes. Hang them from a doorway with tape. They move when anyone walks past, and that is the whole effect.
Then the jar lantern. An empty jam jar, a face cut from black paper and taped inside, a battery tea light dropped in. It looks far better at dusk than it has any right to.
All three take under ten minutes each to explain and then run on their own. You are aiming for something she can do in the next room while you cook.
That matters more than it sounds here. Everything on this list is paper, tissue and a jar, and a real candle inside any of it is a fire. Battery tea lights cost almost nothing and they can be left on all evening without anyone watching them.
The ones worth buying something small for
Most of this needs nothing. Two exceptions earn their money, and both work because they let a child produce something that looks finished.
FUNNYB&G Foil Art Craft Kit for Kids
As an Amazon Associate, Decoded Kids earns from qualifying purchases. Price checked live on Amazon.
Foil art gives a shiny result in about fifteen minutes with no skill involved. Useful for the child who has already decided she is bad at art, because the outcome does not depend on her lines being right.
Puppets become ghosts and monsters without anybody deciding they will. They also outlast October, which the tissue ghosts will not.
Beyond those two, the shopping list is black paper, white tissue, tape and a pack of battery tea lights. If you are already stocked for the winter craft season, the same supply box does December.
The pumpkin, which is its own thing
Carving is not really a craft, it is a job with a knife in it. The child does the scooping and the drawing, you do the cutting, and everybody is clear about that beforehand.
Let her draw the face directly on the pumpkin with a marker and then cut exactly what she drew. Improving it while you cut is the fastest way to ruin the afternoon, and she will spot it.
If the knife part is too much this year, a marker pumpkin is a real option. No cutting, no rot, and it lasts until November. We went through the wider trip in the pumpkin patch guide, which is a different afternoon with its own problems.
When the decorations are the problem
Some children make bats happily and then cannot walk past the neighbour’s inflatable. Those are not opposite things. Making a scary thing yourself is how a child gets on top of it, because she decides what the face looks like and where it goes.
So if yours is wary, lean into the making and keep the house gentle. Friendly ghosts, a jar with a smile on it, nothing that jumps. The skeleton in the lawn chair covers what to do when the fear is coming from outside your own front door.
The window is the best surface in the house
This is the one people miss. A decoration on the wall is seen by you. A decoration in the window is seen by everyone walking past, and a child knows the difference.
Black paper silhouettes taped to the inside of the glass work better than anything else here. A cat, a witch shape, a row of her bats. Put a lamp on the floor behind them after dark and the whole thing reads from the street.
Tissue paper stuck to the glass with a smear of watered-down glue is the other version, and it comes off with a wet cloth in November. Orange and black scraps overlapping look like stained glass once the light is behind them, and a three year old can do it standing up.
Take her outside to look at it from the pavement once it is dark. That thirty seconds is most of the payoff.
What survives into next year
Almost none of it, and that is fine. The jar comes back out, the puppets live in a box, and everything else goes in the recycling in November.
Take a photo of the stairs while they are covered. That is the thing you will want in five years, not the bats.
Leave the first comment
Share your thoughts
Frequently asked questions
Paper bats, tissue ghosts and jar lanterns. All three work because there is no correct result, so a child can keep going without an adult checking. They use black paper, white tissue, tape and a jam jar, which most houses already have somewhere.
No. Paper and tissue decorations and real flames do not belong together. The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests a battery flameless candle, a flashlight or a glow stick instead. Battery tea lights are cheap and can be left on all evening unattended.
Split the job rather than picking an age. Young children scoop and draw the face, an adult does all the cutting. Many children are ready to use a small pumpkin saw around ten with someone next to them, but a drawn marker pumpkin works at any age.
Those go together more often than you would think. Making a scary thing is how a child gets control of it, because she chooses the face and where it goes. Keep your own house friendly, avoid anything that jumps or makes noise, and let her set the tone.
Leave them into November even once the tape starts failing. Taking a child’s work down the morning after sends a message about whose decorations they were. Put them somewhere low enough that she walks past her own work several times a day.
I'm for the parent doing it largely alone. I've done the single-dad decade - two homes, one income, the handovers, the very quiet Tuesdays - and I write from the far side of most of those days, with humour and hard-won calm. Not advice from above; a hand back from a few steps up the road.
More from DiegoWhat's the one thing that actually calmed the chaos in your house?
No right answers here - tell us how it actually went. Someone reading needs to hear it.
Join the conversation