Spooky Season + Sustainability

Hello hello! It is officially October which means Spooky Season is upon us (but yes my apartment has been decorated for Halloween for weeks already)! Halloween is one of my favorite holidays because I love the colors and the decorations and seeing all of the fun costumes and just feeling all of the fall vibes. I thought it would be the perfect time to put together a post on how to keep Halloween fairly sustainable with some tips on decor, costumes, and more! I hope everyone is ready to get into it!

First, I want to start with costumes!

When I was growing up, my mom used to take my sister and I to Goodwill to pick out pieces for our costumes. Over the years we purchased wedding dresses, prom dresses, "old man" clothes, and so much more. We would then take our finds home and turn them into the costumes of our dreams. I remember turning a blue prom-like dress into a tulle and vine covered fairy costume, and a purple formal dress into a sock covered look fit for a queen. Not only were these costumes creative, original, and fun, but they were also pretty darn sustainable. Halloween costumes are rarely worn more than once, so by purchasing the items secondhand, there is no new waste coming from the costumes. In the last month or so, the Goodwill closest to me has been gearing up for the holidays with hangers full of halloween costumes. So! if DIY isn't your style, there may just be an already curated, secondhand costume waiting for you.

Another great option for costumes is a full DIY. No Goodwill, just cardboard. My very best friend always had some of the most creative costumes when we were growing up. Her and her lovely mom would work super hard to turn a cardboard box into a fantastic costume. Some prime examples included a washing machine, a bathtub, and an outhouse, I mean.. come on, that's pretty cool. I'm sure most of us have a spare cardboard box or two lying around that would be a perfect candidate for a great DIY costume. By using items that are already in our homes, we are giving a new, and much more fun life, to what would generally just hang out in the garage. If cardboard isn't your style, try rummaging around in your closet or the closet of family members or friends and you may just find a costume that needs little to no work. Last year for example, my mom and I were cleaning out some boxes in the attic and discovered some of her dresses from her early days as a teacher. I used one of those dresses, curled my hair, threw on some frog earrings, frog socks, and a frog broach and I became my mom, or what I told strangers, Miss Frizzle.

This year, I'll be on a little family getaway for Halloween so if anyone has suggestions for a 6 person group costume, please let me know!

Let's move on to decorations!

As I mentioned, my apartment has been decorated for a few weeks already. The first thing to put up was my string of ghosts. I have had these 6 little cardboard ghosts on a string for almost 6 years now, they have been with me since my first year of college and I pin them above my bedroom door every year. I also have quite a few little pumpkins that I have collected over the years, mostly from Target I will admit, but there are no new decorations making their way in this year. I am only using what I already had or looking at thrift stores for used pieces to add to my collection. By refraining from purchasing more, new, tiny pumpkins, I am saving some fun pieces for others, and allowing myself to work with what I have and keep the waste to a minimum. Aside from my past decorations, I also have a few real pumpkins from my parents' garden which will end up being composted back to the earth at the end of the season.

Another low-waste decoration option is to use dried flowers. I recently bought a bouquet of orange and yellow flowers that I let dry out. These add a little spooky effect to my side table and can again, be composted at the end of the season. Goodwill and other local thrift shops are well equipped with halloween decorations this year. There were at least 2 rows of shelves full of spooky, orange, and fall themed decorations at my nearest Goodwill and they are about half the price of what you'd expect at a traditional store such as Target or Fred Meyer.

I think there is probably a thrifting trip in my near future to stock up on a few more essential decorations to make my apartment even more spooky.

Now that we have touched on costumes and decorations, arguably the most important aspects of Halloween, I have one last low-waste tip for this spooky season. I know personally I love a trip to the pumpkin patch and I love carving pumpkins (despite being absolutely awful at it), but a lot of the pumpkin typically goes to waste. When scooping out the pumpkin guts, keep the seeds separate from the orange goop. Baked pumpkin seeds are an amazing snack and are super easy to make. There are countless variations of flavors to use and it makes use of an often discarded piece of the pumpkin. Once the pumpkin reaches a point where it is no longer suitable to keep, consider composting or find a local goat to feed it to!

Although I do try to keep my waste low, I know there are other aspects of the holiday season and life in general that are difficult to keep sustainable. Candy for example, although I am not a trick-or-treater anymore, I love halloween candy (yes, candy corn included, don't hate me), and I give myself a pass to buy a plastic bag or two or three of candy. Overall I am already doing less to harm the environment than the big ol corporations out there, so some candy won't cause much harm.

I hope a few people have found some new ideas for costumes or decorations from reading this, and please let me know of any other suggestions or 6 person halloween costume ideas!

Have a great weekend! :) :) :)