A Spooky Spiderweb For Halloween: Easy Halloween Yard Decorations

For years my Halloween decorations consisted of a few carved pumpkins and the fall leaves I hadn’t managed to rake out of the yard yet, but as the kids have gotten older they’ve goaded me into more and more decorations. Thus the pumpkins were joined by a skeleton, and a ghost, and a few ceramic pumpkins. This year we took our display up a notch, moving it from the front porch out into the yard with our giant spider web. This web is so easy to make – as long as you’ve got a tree or large bushes to use as an anchor it goes up quickly (and cheaply)!

Start by stringing the support/scaffolding lines of the web. I used regular old jute garden twine (I have a spool that I bought like 10 years ago and it’s seriously never ending – I don’t know what I have to do to use this stuff up). String up 5 support lines – 4 diagonal crossing lines and one vertical line that all meet in the middle. I secured the lines to branches of our big oak tree across the top, and to metal stakes (just big nails, really) stuck into the lawn on the bottom. If you don’t have branches in quite the right spot you could string a line across the top to start with. Start with your outer diagonals, then the two inner diagonals, then use the vertical line to join them all together in the middle by wrapping it once or twice around the other lines where they meet.

 

Next, start your spiral. I started on the outside and worked my way in, but you could go the other way as well. Try not to make it so evenly spaced, that will make it look more natural. I pulled off a large piece of twine and started wrapping it through the support lines, giving it a turn or two at each line to hold it in place. Tie it off at the end and start another line (it was too unwieldy to pass the whole spool through the web, but if I’d had a smaller spool that would have been the easiest thing to do).

Finally, add a spider or two for that final creepy spooky touch (these were from our local pharmacy – nothing fancy but they look great on the web). Our house is ready for Halloween! Of course we only get about 5 trick-or-treaters a year, but we’re ready for them all the same. Do you decorate for Halloween? What’s your favorite decoration? And, full size or fun size?