Make a Miniature Haunted House

Have some spook-tacular fun with the kids this Halloween, by making your own ghouls and goblins and a miniature haunted house from materials in your own home!

Empty cardboard box – like a shoebox or cereal box
Extra cardboard that you can cut up
Black paint
Monofilament string (white)
Small action figures/dolls
Collage-y materials from around the house (i.e., yarn, buttons, cotton balls, tissue, fabric scraps)
Glue
Tape
Chenille wire
White card stock

Instructions:

1. Scare up an empty box like a shoe or cereal box. Paint it black inside and out. As it's drying, go on a scavenger hunt around the house gathering building materials and objects to inhabit your house: action figures, yarn, buttons, cotton balls, tissue and other handy and collage'y material.
2. Pick a place on your house for windows with creaky shutters by cutting a capital letter "I" and a squeaky door by cutting a square-shaped "C." (Parents participation required for all cardboard cutting!)
3. Add a second story to the house by cutting a piece of cardboard a little bit wider than the width of the box. Add a trap door by cutting a square-shaped "C." Wedge the floor into place and secure with glue or tape.
4. Landscape the yard with silhouettes of leafless trees cut from cardboard and painted black. What're those spooky silhouettes in the tree... a black cat, an owl, a family of bats?!!
5. Gather up some of your shorter action figures and wrap them up like mummies using the white string. Who else can creep around the house... a witch, a goblin, a vampire? Dress up other action figures or you can also make eerie figures out of clay!
6. Add creepy-crawly spiders by stacking two or three buttons and wiring them together with chenille wire. Attach a length of monofilament string so they can scurry up the walls!
7. Haunt your house with ghosts made out of white fabric or tissue. They can fly through the house by attaching them to an monofilament string zip line attached from side wall to side wall.
8. And no house would be complete without the haunted portrait whose eyes follow you wherever you go! Create a portrait of an eerie character on card stock then cut two vertical slits on either side of the eyes. Next, cut a strip of card stock nearly twice the width of the portrait and slip it through the slits. Add mini googly eyes or draw your own spooky eyes. Slide the strip back and forth and see the eyes following you!
9. What else will you come up with? Share your ideas on the site: www.Family.com/PossibilityShop.

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