Spooktacular Halloween ideas 🎃

Autumn’s here. The nights are drawing in, there’s a definite chill in the air and pumpkin spiced everything, everywhere. Halloween’s just around the corner on 31 October.

Dressing up in creepy costumes, going “trick-or-treating” and scaring ourselves stupid watching horror movies – ever wondered why we do it? Here’s some info on why Halloween’s a thing and some ideas on how you can celebrate it this year.

The word Halloween or Hallowe’en comes from All Hallows’ Even, meaning the eve of All Hallows’ Day – All Saints Day.

Halloween celebrations are thought to date back to Samhain – an ancient Celtic festival. It celebrates the end of summer and harvest and the start of the Celtic New Year on 1 November.

Why do we celebrate Halloween? Well, it was believed by many that on the night of 31 October, the boundary between the spirit and living worlds was weaker. And that weak boundary lets spirits return to the living world.

And to scare off any evil spirits that might have been lurking, people would dress up in scary costumes and light bonfires.

Carving pumpkins, creepy costumes and scaring yourself silly watching horror movies – there are loads of ways to celebrate Halloween. Here are some of our favourite Halloween ideas.

These days, Halloween costumes are less about scaring the neighbours and more about getting likes. Cutting eyeholes in a sheet and flinging it on over your head as a make-shift ghost costume, just won’t do.

The best way to get likes flooding in, is with a super-gory costume or with some beautifully frightening Halloween make-up.  And how are you going to document your work of Halloween-y art?  With a perfect selfie, obviously.

Our favourite devices with selfie cameras to die for are:

iPhone XS
The Portrait Mode on the iPhone XS is awesome. It brings depth to your selfies and you can tweak the depth after you’ve taken the photo. It gives you that pro “Bokeh” effect, blurring the background, bringing clarity and vibrancy to whatever you’ve got in the foreground. So, you can show off your face in all its gloriously gruesome, Halloween glory.

Google Pixel 3

Got your mates round before your big Halloween night out? Want to get a group selfie but don’t want to sacrifice the axe sticking out of your mate’s head? It completes their costume, after all. Then the Google Pixel 3 has the answer: Group Selfie. Just zoom out to get everyone, costumes and all, in the shot.

“Trick-or-treating” or a Halloween night out not your thing? But still want to show off your awesome costume?

Why not have a Halloween party?

Grab yourself some demonic decorations and start planning those Halloween party games. How about bobbing apples? Or pin the bone on the skeleton? And make your house fit for a monster mash, complete with a spooky playlist.

Don’t want the pressure of making the perfect Halloween playlist? Then check out some of the Spooktacular Halloween party playlists on Apple Music or Deezer.

Don’t fancy being the host with the most? Then just rock up to one of the organised events happening around the country. Theme parks like Thorpe Park and Alton Towers pull out all the stops to create spooky events.

And if you want to go one step beyond and spook yourself crazy, head to Scare Kingdom Scream Park in Lancashire. It’s devoted to doom and is the UK’s top-rated Halloween attraction.

Dressing up and heading out to a Halloween party not your thing? Then grab some snack, build a blanket fort, and have yourself a good ol’ Halloween movie fest.

Netflisx are bring out the big ghouls this year with more fearsome flicks than you can shake a broomstick at. Go retro with The Shining from 1980. Or bring it up to date with 2017’s Veronica, which is known as one of the scariest films ever made.