Hogwarts’ themed Halloween Decor

Halloween is such a fun time of year and there's nothing I enjoy more than an excuse to dress up! Also, being a hardcore Potter fan, this time of the year brings back all those Hogwart memories. So we're planning a bit of a party and plenty of (adult-supervised) trick or treating.
But our tired orange-and-black decos needed a bit of updating, so this year we've looked to Harry Potter for a little inspiration.

I used my home office desk and transformed it into something special from Hogwarts.

   

Step 1: Tea painting

   

I'm starting here because this is a really simple and fun activity and if you know any toddlers it is a great one to get them involved with! Steep a few teabags in some warm water. When the water is a nice dark brown, paint directly on to your sheets of paper using the teabags. Be gentle, so the teabags don't split, but really anything goes! Once they are dry you have some lovely old parchment to turn into Harry-Potter-style props! Also you could brew coffee and use a brush, that works wonders too!
Step 2: What you will need

Now you've made your 'parchment' , gather together the rest of your props. The great thing about using Harry Potter as a theme is it gives you a great deal of flexibility - JK Rowling imagined such a rich and detailed world, you can adapt the theme to suit what you already have lying around.
Make use of the usual Halloween paraphernalia - pumpkins, plastic spiders, cotton wool cobwebs etc. These broomsticks were picked up very cheaply in our local Supermarket.
Claret and Gold are good colours for table cloths and drapes as these are the colours of Harry Potter's house at Hogwarts: Gryffindor. Luckily I found a great Sparkle Table runner. And if you happen to have a birdcage with an owl inside...(that would be perfect!) ;)

Step 3: The Hogwarts Parcels

Wrapping up some empty boxes with brown paper and string is a really simple idea to create the Hogwarts look. What has Harry bought in Diagon Alley this year?

   

Step 4: Harry's Text Books

The 'parchment' you painted earlier is great for using as dust covers on books, spells, maps and other manuscripts. We've gone for The Standard Book of Spells, Quidditch Through the Ages, and Defence Against the Dark Arts here, but you could get a whole lot more creative if you wanted to - a great activity for older children to get involved with perhaps?
Step 5: Potion Bottles

These potion jars are a really simple, cheap idea that looks great in a Harry Potter theme. Wash out a selection of old bottles and jars and make some labels using the 'parchment' you made earlier like I did, or go for this amazing free printable from Over the Moon.

They can be filled with bits of twigs and leaves from the garden or maybe some jelly worms or gobstopper eyeballs. To age them, drizzle a little kitchen oil around the top of the bottles and then dust with talcum powder. Wine corks make for good lids or try greaseproof paper tied on with string.
Step 6: Novelty treats

These apothecary jars also make for great little treats. Fill baby food jars (as shown here) or small jam jars or sauce bottles with a few scary-looking treats. It keeps unwrapped sweets from being handled by two many little fingers prior to eating and makes it a bit easier to monitor how many everyone's eaten! Seal the tops with greaseproof paper and string and they are really convenient to distribute at the door or take home at the end of the party. These little jars would also be a great way to serve up fruit jellies.
Step 7: Wands and branches

In the world of Harry Potter no two wands are the same - so wand creation is a great opportunity to go for a forage for twigs in your local park or garden! If you're lucky enough to have access to some twisted hazel, these unusual branches also make for a great table decoration. Strip the leaves. You can then either fashion your twigs into wands or use them as a Halloween table decoration.
Step 8: Lighting

The lighting at Hogwarts is fab inspiration for a Halloween theme - when it comes to candles, lanterns and scones more is more!
There are so many ways to develop this theme. Thanks to the imagination of JK Rowling, the world of Harry Potter is rich in inspiration - just let your imagination run riot! Happy Halloween!

Get 'Old School' with Shabby Chic Decor!

Via Modern Country Style

Although I am 20-something, I often get remarks like, "Oh dear, You have a granny's soul" or "Sweetie, you were just born in the wrong era, this new century is just not your cup of tea!"

And I proudly claim that its true, when it comes to home decor and interior, I am an OLD soul still ravishing olden styles and designs. One of my favorite is Shabby chic style of interior décor that revolves around furniture and furnishings that look aged and time-tested, without actually being in poor condition or broken. It is possible to create the look with entirely new furniture, and this requires a steady hand and great finesse to get the look exactly right – in the Goldilocks zone, as it were, 'just right!' It is not necessary to have every piece of furniture and every accessory and soft furnishing be shabby chic – in fact, that can create an overwhelming aura of just 'shabby,' and very little 'chic!'

Via Ruffled

Highlight the Room

Choose one or two pieces to carry off the shabby chic theme, keeping everything else beautifully modern or neutral. A large old-fashioned sideboard, with a collection of vintage ornaments or old sepia photographs on top can create a wonderfully old-fashioned air in an otherwise up-to-date room.

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Small Touches Nodding to History

If you love your brand new furniture, you do not have to make any of it look old or 'tatty'. You can add that wonderful nostalgia purely with small touches. A retro telephone, black and white photographs that hearken from the desired era, or even authentic vintage cushion covers and curtains can infuse enough old style into a room to create the perfect shabby chic living room.

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Make Your Own!

If you have scoured car boot sales, auctions, charity shops and second hand furniture shops looking for the iconic shabby chic look, but had no luck, do not give up your shabby chic dream just yet. You can create the look fairly easily, with the investment of an hour or two and some paint and sandpaper. 

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Source a sturdy piece of furniture, in the style that you like. Sand it down lightly to remove the polished finish, then paint it in the bottom colour. Do not worry about making the paint even, gaps and streaks are fine. Once that has dried apply the top colour to the furniture item and allow that to dry. Take the sandpaper and gently 'distress' the edges and corners, removing the top coat to allow the bottom coat to show through in patches. When this is done properly (and it is only practise that will teach you the best methods!) the piece of furniture looks like a wonderfully sturdy, old heirloom that has stood the test of time. And ofcourse, accessories always look ravishing matched with smart furniture!

Fabrics Can Play Their Part Too

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Many people adore the vintage and retro styles of curtains and fabric coverings, and they are now widely available. You should be easily able to source curtains that strike a nostalgic chord as being exactly like those your grandparents had! Vintage, old-style curtains, an abundance of lace or crochet – especially antimacassars – can add just enough of that old-school charm to infuse your living room which that shabby chic air that is so popular at present.  

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Study your current living room, and plan out what changes you would need to make in order to add a hint of past glory to the room. Once you have a plan of action, begin to make changes in order to achieve that dream, and before you know it you will have the shabby chic living room of your dreams!

Share your thoughts and comments would LOVE to know your views!

xoxo

Eva

Instantaneously beautify nooks and corners!

Quick tip coming up: Use old wine bottles for decorating nooks and corners. This actually took me less than 5 min. The picture colors are distorted, but it really brightens up the window now! :D

My newfound inspiration: The Inspired Room!

Hello everyone! I have been away for a while! But have great posts coming up soon, so stay tuned!

Today I will be reviewing one of my very Favorite blogs; “The Inspired Room” (Melissa has provided me much needed inspiration) and I love the easy and quick to do steps; which are her trademark. Being a Home Interior fanatic, honestly plants and gardens were a second love, but now I think they've paired up equally with my love for interior and designing! I recently started following The Inspired Room, but have become a die-hard fan of Melissa’s work. I want to share some of my favorite pieces with my readers.  

(Click on the images to see the original post)

For instance this amazing tea cart turned into plant stand is a fabulous idea for gardens with limited space, and especially for people who love to garden yet don’t have space. Therefore you may carry on your passion with limited space!

And, you can keep them inside and trolley them outdoors for sun and the photosynthesis process! What a great idea!

 

 

  The 5 minute garden is also one of my personal favorites! So adorable, right?

But these 5 minute teacup plants are to die for! Not only do they look beautiful, but are an easy DIY project for beginners (like myself!)

 Being a DIY/Home décor enthusiast, I am looking forward to getting a theme and teacup for each room of the house. They can easily be used to brighten a room and add natural elements. 

A big round of applaud for Melissa and her wonderful creations!

Go Green: Interior Decor to Save the Planet!

Everyone wants to 'do their bit' these days by helping the environment. Many people do this by recycling paper, plastics and tins and even wood and fabric wherever possible but most are not aware that there are many other ways of helping the environment, some of which can even save them money!

A large difference can be made within the home, by changing the way the home is insulated and heated. Old boilers are sometimes inefficient and draughty doors, window frames and insufficient insulation in the walls and ceiling space can all cause a house to leak warmth pushing up bills and straining resources.

These matters are easily sorted, although they may require the outlay of a biggish lump sum, but they do not do anything to enhance the interior of the house. However it is possible to make your house a beautiful and welcoming home and help the environment at the same, simply by making good choices at the planning and purchasing stage.

Eco Friendly Paint for the Walls and Points of Interest

Traditional paints are known for being unsafe to breathe during use and for a short time afterwards. This is because these paints are loaded with chemicals that include formaldehyde, heavy metals and substances known as Volatile Organic Chemicals, or VOCs for short. It is this chemical cocktail that has seen painters and decorators suffering from dramatically increased incidences of lung cancer than the rest of the population.

Producing traditional paints is also very unfriendly to resources, each litre of paint resulting in some 30 litres of toxic waste. Paint manufacturers quickly realised that their product does not have the most satisfactory makeup and set about improving and innovating methods and recipes. Eco-paints used to be only available in powder form that requiring careful measuring to produce sufficient quantities of acceptable paint before you could begin, but manufacturers are now producing ready-mixed paint in a large variety of shades and hues. 

Photo From: The Green Connoisseur

There is a reduced level of VOCs in these paints, and some still contain unpleasant chemicals, but they are a decided step in the right direction. They are a little more expensive than traditional paints, but help the whole family to reduce their carbon footprint, which is well worth the extra pennies. Guardian.co.uk recommends earthBorn and Pots of Paint as some of the eco-friendly paints manufacturers in a post here.

Soft Furnishings: Making Good from Old

Curtains and carpets can and should be recycled whenever possible. If you are redoing a small bedroom, off-cuts from discarded larger carpets can sometimes fit the bill perfectly. Purchase pelmet covers, curtains and any other soft furnishings from charity shops, estate sales and auction houses.

 

Photo From: Jane Foster

Reusing old items saves on the resources needed to make new ones and can make a significant difference to the eco-friendliness of your home. If you do not want a carpet any more, reclaimed wooden boards can be laid to create a wonderfully textured floor. Judicious use of a hired sanding machine can make old boards look like new, at a fraction of the cost and with little negative impact on the world's forests. 

Photo From: KBCulture

Furniture Choices can Save Resources

Furniture should be chosen for the wood it is made of and the way those trees are managed. Sustainable forests grow quickly and well and each tree is replaced to ensure that the resource does not dwindle away. Get rid of damaged furniture that can’t be used any longer and buy new new furniture. Purchase old pieces and reupholster or paint them to perfectly blend into your vision for the room either. Some manufacturers specialize in making beautiful pieces of furniture from reclaimed wood, which is another excellent way to get maximum usage from timber, thereby saving the need for unnecessary tree felling. 

Photo From: CalFinder

So you see, it is relatively easy to make 'green' practices an integral part of your lifestyle and your home, allowing you to feel the satisfaction of having a beautiful, comfortable and warm home and knowing that you have made good progress in reducing your carbon footprint, saving essential resources and making the planet that little bit more sustainable.

Photo From: Riva Interiors