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"  With Halloween rapidly approaching, it&amp;#039;s almost time to carve your jack-o-lantern and set out decorations. Don&amp;#039;t get spooked by the high-costs that can come with Halloween. Our intern Dina Davis, a junior at New York University, shares her family&amp;#039;s tricks for saving on costumes, decorations, and more! &amp;quot;When I was younger, Halloween wasn&amp;#039;t just about the candy and dressing up. Most of the fun came from other activities like preparing decorations and planning costumes with my family. And we were always able to celebrate at a low cost. &amp;quot;We started by designing our own homemade costumes. Sometimes they were simple; once, I wore a nightgown and painted my face to look like the Big Bad Wolf from Little Red Riding Hood. Other times they were complex, such as when I dressed-up as Mr. Potato Head. My father bent metal hangers to form the body while my mother sewed the fabric over it. Then, the eyes, mouth, nose, and ears were created from felt and cotton stuffing and attached by Velcro so they could be moved around. For more ideas for homemade costumes, see these submissions from our readers. &amp;quot;We saved on decorations by building ours from scratch. My favorites were tombstones made from cardboard or plywood. We shaped the material, painted it grey, and wrote names like &amp;#039;Berry Half-a-Way&amp;#039;, finishing it off by putting an old pair of jeans filled with crumpled newspaper and shoes on a stick and plunging it into the ground to create the illusion of a half buried man. For other fun ideas, check out our homemade decorations in Dazzling DIY Halloween Decorations. &amp;quot;Once Halloween arrives, you can save money by using pillowcases to hold treats and buying candy in bulk to hand out to the neighborhood children. If you&amp;#039;re having a party, it&amp;#039;s a good idea to bake your own Halloween treats instead of buying them from the store. Try making your own with our &amp;quot;Homemade Halloween Treats&amp;quot; recipes.&amp;quot; Have a safe and inexpensive holiday. Happy Halloween! "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/institute/a20670/fast-easy-inexpensive-halloween-ideas/>