Halloween doesn’t have to cost an arm and a leg. Here are some ways to make Halloween free or very easy on the wallet:

Recipe to make free homemade fake blood and face paint – why go out and spend money on this stuff when you have the ingredients in your pantry?

Make Your Own Halloween Costumes – huge list of ideas and resources here, including no-sew costumes, animals, creatures, cardboard box costumes, costumes for couples and more.

Free Halloween Music – yikes, this was some creepy stuff. Would be great to play on your doorstep to scare the little trick or treaters. You can save the tracks to your computer by right-clicking on the file name and choose Save Link As or Save Target As.

Free Halloween Printables – some fun coloring pages and activity sheets

13 Creative Ways to Dye and Decorate Easter Eggs (a very popular post from last year that has been recently featured on BeliefNet)

Totally cute Pipe Cleaner Finger Puppets – be sure to browse around this site- lots of good stuff.

Resurrection Eggs – bringing the focus back to the “reason for the season”.

Printable Easter Mazes from Animal Jr.

Huge list of Easter activities and coloring sheets

And… don’t forget to have a Peep War or two: When toothpicks are inserted into the sides of two marshmallow peeps which are facing each other in a microwave. When the microwave is turned on, the peeps swell and each peep’s toothpick will poke the other peep. The peep that does not explode is the winner!

Santa Claus Early Reader Activity Book

Decorate your house or room with these snowflake cutouts from Ben & Jerry’s

Printables4Kids has some cute printable gift tags to color

Christmas Story Advent Coloring Book with Bible verses on each page to go along with each part of the Christmas story

If you’re feeling a bit more ambitious, Parents.com has a great video with some ornament craft ideas and instructions for making a super cute elf ornament with wooden beads and felt. I have made the glass ornaments with swirls acrylic paints in the past and they are just beautiful.

If you’re looking for some holiday craft ideas, how about making a Thanksgiving Tree this year?  This is a nice idea to remind us throughout the holidays of the many blessings we are thankful for.

Preserving leaves: there are several methods, including the relatively simple preservation in wax paper, to the more tedious preservation method of submerging them in glycerin.  The results are beautiful, and the leaves would make a great Autumn/Thanksgiving table decoration.  Scatter your leaf collection over the table and buy a cheap, clear plastic tablecloth to cover the table and leaves with.

Leaf Placemats: this is another easy way to decorate your table for the season. Cut out two sheets of clear contact paper in the size you’d like your placemats to be. Scatter leaves you’ve collected on one sheet and place the second sheet on top to seal in the leaves.

Ready for Halloween? Pumpkin carving is one of the best parts of the holiday. Last year we featured some great pumpkin carving patterns, and for this year’s holiday we have a pumpkin carving set to give away!!

To enter, please leave a comment on this post and include your best costume idea before midnight October 8, 2008. Good luck!!*

If you’re interested in doing some pumpkin decorating, I found an awesome site called PumpkinCarving101. The site includes the history of carving, how to grow pumpkins, how to carve and light your pumpkin and even a fun “burial tradition” for your creations.

Don’t miss this great post from our archives too- Free and Easy Halloween Costumes

*you must include a valid e-mail address so I can contact you, and I’m very sorry, but I cannot ship to anywhere outside the US.

If your kids enjoy print and build toys, you should definitely check out Cubecraft.com. Each toy is designed to be printed on a standard piece of 8 1/2 X 11 A4 letter paper, and features interlocking tabs for construction – eliminating the need for tape, glue or other messy adhesives. There are lots of cool action figures to choose from- even Batman, Indiana Jones and Hellboy!