How to Decorate your Haunted House for Halloween on a Budget

• Gather up your supplies: Old pieces of cardboard, colored paper, markers, and glue are some of the things you can use.
• Take cardboard and cut out bat shapes (use a stencil if you need to): After you cut them out, use markers or paint to add color. Black bats look great hanging with a bit of fishing wire or string.
• Make fake tombstones out of cardboard: Just cut out the shape, paint it gray, and write RIP or other sayings on them. They can then be placed in a window, or in a place where they won’t get wet.
• Use yarn or crepe paper to create giant spider webs for windows
• Use colored paper to cut out pumpkins, black cats, or other Halloween pictures: These can be placed in windows, or on walls.
• Recycle old costumes and clothes: Old masks can be used to make life-size monsters with just some old clothes and newspapers.

Need more Halloween decorating ideas? Take a look at these tips:

We love this spooky Halloween decorating tricks and tips from Homedit.com

These 14 Halloween projects from Popular Mechanic will help you will more decorating ideas.

Want to make Halloween Specimen Jars?

Try making these Halloween specimen jars for your Halloween party:

Haunted House Decorating Tips:

• Keep scraps of fabric and old clothes throughout the year. These will come in handy to make scarecrows or other life size beings.
• Alternatively, instead of the yarn spider webs, you can purchase bags of “fake webbing” for very little cost, these often include small plastic spiders and the occasional glow-in-the-dark ones as well.
• For a bonus, change out your front porch light with a black light. It gives an extra creepy glow.
• If you happen to be a gardener, save any dead flowers and plants. Putting out some dead flowers and plants can make your house look haunted (just get rid of all the dead plants after Halloween!)
• Stick bin-bags to front windows and stick CSI tape to the front of the house to make it seem deserted.

Haunted House ideas:

Watch the haunted house video here for more ideas!

For more DIY ideas on Stagetecture, & Stagetecture’s YouTube Channel, click here.

Round Up: Our Favorite Budget Wedding Planning Tips

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Consider Wedding Packages

Believe us or not, a wedding package can save you a lot of cash. As they include everything from venue and food to host and the decorations, they come out to be much affordable than buying individual items. Moreover, it will take away a lot of efforts that you need to put in when finding things for the venue. The best part? Wedding packages can be customized to your need and the theme.

Buy In-Season Flowers

Wedding flowers can easily run you up in thousands. To cut costs, make sure to order the ones that are in-season. Not only will it help you save money but will also be beneficial for the mother earth as blooms that are seasonal can be sourced locally helping to keep the transportation emissions low. Also, if your creativity allows, order loose stems and consider making the arrangements by yourself. Trust us; it’s not as difficult as it sounds. Alternatively, you can order flowers online at much cheaper prices instead of a traditional florist.

Trim Your Guest List

One of the easiest ways to cut your budget is by trimming your guest list. We agree that wedding is a celebration, but it’s also a very intimate moment. When budget is a concern, stick to a guest list that doesn’t go beyond immediate family and closet of friends. Not only will it help you save tons of cash, but you will also end up spending this meaningful day with those you value the most.

Choose an Off-season Date

Weddings can be celebrated at any time of the year, but if you plan your big day choose off-season wedding date the savings can be significant. During off-season the wedding vendors hunger for business. This provides couples an opportunity to negotiate better pricing and save significantly.

A budget wedding does not mean you have to skimp on style. All it requires is a little imagination, creativity, and of course cutting on those extras. Let us know what’s your take on planning a memorable evening without going overboard?

Fore more budget wedding tips on Stagetecture, click here.

Home Decor: Ways to Decorate for Spring on a Budget

Image via: The Budget Decorator

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Color the wall

One of the simplest and the cheapest ways to update your home decor is by injecting some seasonal color into a room. Depending on your budget, you could paint all the walls or only one wall or the ceiling. If anything is left, consider re-coloring a cabinet or a table to add some quirkiness to the area. However, make sure to stick to a color scheme as you don’t want your space to get too overpowering.

Freshen up the room with flowers

What says spring more than flowers? Those bunch of seasonal blooms might be freshly picked or you might consider to grow them in pots by your windowsill. In fact, they don’t have to be fresh. You could even consider faux flowers placed in a vase, or adding flower patterned bed sheets, pillow covers to set the springtime mood.

Image via: Home Goods

Rearrange the furniture

Rearranging the furniture is perhaps the most inexpensive ways to redecorate. Change the position of the sofas, chairs, and the tables or consider switching it up by moving furniture pieces from one room to another. This will give both the rooms a fresh look and a different vibe. The best part is, it won’t cost you anything except a bit of manpower.

For those of us who live on a tight budget, decorating your home every season and all the expenses associated with it can be a real deal breaker. That’s why we bring to you these home decor tips that will help you embrace the new season without going overboard. Use these ideas and transform your home into a renewed space!

For more spring color ideas on Stagetecture, click here.

Having beautiful flowers at the wedding is traditionally essential. But they are very costly and can be a problem for any wedding’s budget. There are however a few things that can cut the cost of flower decorations, without cutting the overall appeal of the wedding. Here are some ways to save your money on wedding flowers.

Wedding Flowers: Saving Money in your Wedding Planning

Image via: Style Me Pretty

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Choose Flowers that are in Season

Flowers are mostly seasonal dependent items. Although one can nowadays find anything at any time, buying out of season flowers can be a quite unbearable expense. The best way to find out what is seasonal is to consult your florist. He will be able to explain all alternatives to you and provide valuable information.

Use Non-Traditional Elements

It really has not to be always traditional flowers. There are so many beautiful items that can provide wonderful effects. Using fruits, branches, succulents or herbs can add fragrance and beauty to any wedding décor.

If using some expensive flowers is a dream that has to come true, try making arrangements that use only a few flowers as highlights, while the rest of the arrangement consists of beautiful greenery.

Image via: Ruffled

Also, using single blossom flowers in amazing vessels can keep the costs down, since you don’t pay only the flowers, but the work of the florist, also. Buy your vessels in bulk to save money. These vessels can be used later in your home, or give them away as favors.

Give Artificial Flowers a Chance

Artificial flowers can look beautiful and few would know the difference. Choose beautiful silk flowers that will last through time. Hanging fake flower arrangements from height over the tables or inside lanterns will make it near to impossible for others to know that they are in fact not real.

Image via: Etsy

Do Thorough Research on Wedding Flowers

Fancy main street florist may look fabulous, but your neighborhood florist can often make the same amazing job with less money. Research the prizes well and look also on the internet. You might find a great deal on there, especially if you’d pick premade flower arrangements.

Single flowers can be found with better prices if you buy them right from the source. Try to find flower farms near you that sell to the public.

Image via: Homedit

Wedding planning is not an easy task and glowers are a wonderful way to create a fresh and colorful ambience. However try not to overdo it, since you don’t want to take away the focus from the bride and groom.

After the wedding, think about donating the flowers to an institution to spread some cheer, like a nearby hospital or senior center.

For more wedding flower ideas on Stagetecture, click here.

Happy DIY Saturday! Are you tired of your bedroom or need to give it a makeover? Today on DIY Saturday I show you ways to update your bedrooms on a budget! Watch a video on how to transform your guest bedroom and then get ideas for budget friendly bedroom trends.

Image via: Fiorella Design

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Video: Affordable guest bedroom makeover

Video link to –> Affordable guest bedroom makeover

Are you looking for new bedroom furniture?  Then the good news is that current bedroom fashions just happen to favor your wallet.  As recently as five years ago, buying a complete bedroom set was the expected route.  Those basic pieces cost a small fortune when purchased all at once, especially if they were made from solid wood.  Not a budget-friendly style!  While there are plenty of great bedroom sets available, the current trend allows more wiggle room for those of us who like to be a little different…and a lot more affordable.

Mix It Up

Bedrooms are becoming more eclectic to coordinate the rest of the modern home.  That means no more matching!  Start with an item that you absolutely love: a bed, dresser, or even a rug or piece of art.  Then begin searching for pieces that have at least one of three matching design elements: color, texture, or shape (style).  That way your room will always look elegantly eclectic instead of just jumbled.  Write down the measurements of your bedroom and keep them with you in case you stumble upon the perfect piece.

Image via Elle Decor

Embrace the Past

The best place to score unique pieces is anywhere secondhand.  Thanks to design buzzwords like “shabby chic,” “restoration,” and “vintage,” recycled pieces are high on style and low on cost.  When it comes to bedroom furniture, you can find large, wood chests and dressers at a fraction of the price, and tweak it to work in your bedroom with a little DIY.  Keep an eye out for popular items like wrought iron bed frames, armoires, and cute accessories.

Image via indulgy

Make It Yours

Just because flea-market style isn’t your taste doesn’t mean you can’t use mismatched pieces to reflect your style.  Prefer a more masculine look?  Use recycled crates for nightstands and wire baskets for storage.  If you love contemporary design, use open metal shelving and brightly colored décor.  If you’re still unsure of mix-and-match pieces, pick up matching hardware for all of your fixtures and drawer pulls to create a sense of harmony between pieces.  Finally, bring the design of the room together with curtains, bedding, and accessories that share a color scheme and voilà!  You’ve captured the eclectic trend in your bedroom without emptying your wallet.

For more bedroom & living ideas on Stagetecture, click here.

For more DIY ideas on Stagetecture, & Stagetecture’s YouTube Channel, click here.

Ok so we all want a man cave, that’s why we’re here right? And I’m pretty sure most people have some common themes in mind – the pool table, that’s a given, the arcade machine – rude not to! The home bar? Might as well while we are at it.

But as each man cave is unique we’re going to need something above and beyond the norm, and that’s what we’re looking at today – five great ideas you might not have thought of which could actually make the difference between average and awesome! Let’s get started.

Image via: Mark Pinkerton – vi360 Photography

Wall Decorations

This is a man cave and we’re talking about what to hang on the wall? Most men when thinking of their ultimate dream cave pay more attention to what will be going in it there rather than what’s going to be on the walls – after all decorating isn’t for guys right?

Well we’re not talking drapes and color shades you’ve never heard of – we’re talking man-decorations! Maybe a shark head, or perhaps a singing moose, or one of the many other choices out there. Perhaps not the first thing you’d think to buy, but they can become a real talking point!

A Car

Ok so we’d all like Tony Stark’s iron-man-cave, complete with sports cars, but hey those classic cars aren’t cheap! And getting them into the depths of your basement isn’t always going to be an easy job.

So we’ve got one cheeky idea for you – why not just get a model? We’re not talking child’s-play here though, we’re talking full-on scale model replicas that look just like the real thing. Not only that they can be constructed in stages so people will wonder how you ever got them in the room.

Anyway it’s not like if you owned the real thing the insurance company would ever let you drive it, and these little wonders won’t be leaking any oil on your carpet. Still they can still reach into the tens of thousands so they certainly aren’t for the faint of wallet.

Popcorn machine

You might have the home cinema setup (and congratulations if you do!), but if you really want the true cinema experience (minus the other annoying people of course) there is one thing you just have to have – popcorn!

We’re not talking the microwave stuff either, for true man cave aficionados then there nothing will do but the real thing! Luckily you can get a full on commercial popcorn maker for less than one of the bulbs for your home cinema projector – so you’re not likely to break the bank.

Cool Seating

Well this one might seem obvious – I mean of course after all those games of pool, and most likely beers from the home bar, you might need to take the weight off for a couple of minutes. Well this is where you can add another touch of cool to your man cave with a cool couch!

The one we’ve shown here is a Cadillac but there are plenty more of interesting, innovating designs out there, so why settle for a boring run of the mill seat when you can place your butt somewhere that truly stands out!

Image via: Willman Interiors / Gina Willman, ASID

A Robot!

Ok so you might have that home bar installed and fully loaded, but you know what sucks? Having to poor yourself a beer! And until that lottery win a full time resident barman is out of the question, so what is the answer?

Well if you have half of that lottery win then the answer could be a robot barman! Loaded up will all the robo-skills to not only dispense drinks but also impress your friends, and never get tired of your bar stories. Plus we are have been guaranteed that it will not rise up and crush its masters in a judgment-day style rebellion.

So there we have it – five out of the box ideas for you to consider for your man cave. We’re sure there are many more out there, so why not let us know yours in the comments.

This round up of man cave ideas is brought to us by James Cook of UK games room outfitter Liberty Games, who have been making man cave dreams come true for over 10 years.

For more game & man cave ideas on Stagetecture, click here.

For years couples have argued over the topic of a “man cave”; a term many people don’t like the sound of. The thought of one of the rooms in the house turning into a shrine for his favorite football team, beer posters that you would see in a college dorm room and a picnic cooler that belongs in the garage. “Oh yes! Speaking of the garage, I can send him there, I think there is a small space in the corner next to the Christmas decorations, I`ll just send him there.”

Image via: KDS Interiors

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Create a gender neutral man cave

Ladies, a man needs more than a small corner in a packed garage. Although you may have spent years decorating your house and making it a home for your family, your husband`s prized bachelor pad belongings have been stored in a box, packed away for years and he misses them! Besides, he needs a space of his own; somewhere he can unwind after a long day or a place to entertain “the guys”.

If you have the space, an extra room or a den, let him have it but on your terms! A classy man cave is possible and that keeps both partners happy. Invest in a nice leather chair that he can pass down to his son and a big screen TV. Get a small portable fridge and mini bar where he can keep cold beverages and snacks. And the great thing about it, when guests come over to the house (and not just “the guys”) it can be a perfect place for you both to entertain your friends of both genders.

How to add sophistication

Add elements to your man cave that create a distinct theme that is refined and subtle. Traditional elements such as those in a den or library are ideal. Dark wood elements, classical detailing, wood frames around sports memorabilia are just a few ways. Install lighting that is tasteful without being offensive. Your man cave doesn’t have to be sports or hobby related in every interior detail. Modern pendant lighting, even classy chandeliers and comfortable seating is a must. Remember, your man cave should appeal to all who enjoy the room.

Image via: Bernard André

The dreaded term “man cave” has now changed into a more chic term, a “man studio” (but you don`t have to tell him that you changed the name). Let him have his sports paraphernalia but class it up. Put his posters in nice frames and maybe surprise him with a nice pool table or one of his favorite arcade machines from “back in the day,” maybe a pinball machine or a Ms. Pacman. You can then say: “I got him a gift for his man cave” rather than plotting with your friends on how you are going to get rid of it.

If a man cave inside the house is just not possible because you don`t have enough rooms, try to find another space he can call his own. Clean out part of the garage if you can by having a garage sale or donating some of the things that you never use or clear out the basement. After all, no one ever goes in there anyway.

The man studio is a now a place where both genders can find peace and have some of his own space. You don`t have to love it but you don`t have to hate it either. It can be a great place to entertain and who knows, you might find yourself enjoying it more than loathing it!

For more man caves ideas on Stagetecture, click here.

Select Your Room Carefully

Choosing the right room for your home theater can help you save money while giving you a better cinematic experience. For example, if you use a windowless room, you won’t need to invest in heavy drapes to block out the sunlight to improve your picture quality. If you use a small room, you can buy smaller and less expensive speakers to fill the room with sound.

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Choose a Home Theater Projector

Although a flat-screen television offers a bright and crisp picture, a quality projector will give you a larger image for your money. Most projector models allow you to resize the image, giving you flexibility that a flat-screen television can’t offer. In addition, a projector will make your theater room truly feel like a professional theater.

Saving Money On Home9 Equipment

If you opt for the newest and greatest models for your setup, you’ll run out of money quickly. Instead, take your time to look for deals on projectors, speakers, players and other essentials. You can use the Internet to search for last year’s models to find some excellent savings. Additionally, buying refurbished or factory-second models will save you even more money.

Choosing the Right Furniture and Accessories

After you’ve equipped your theater you can accessorize your theater room. You don’t need to invest in expensive leather chairs to provide comfortable seating for you and your family. Shop around your area for affordable chairs that offer style and comfort. With the right arrangement, you can make any seating choice look professional.

Even on a tight budget, you can create an entertainment room that will enthrall your family for hours. With a little extra time and common sense, you can save money on each part of your deluxe home theater.

For more home theater room ideas on Stagetecture

How to Choose the Perfect Flooring for your Budget

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Decide your budget before finding the perfect flooring:

Just like shopping for a home, decide on what you can afford before you fall in love with flooring that is not right for your budget. Online resources and flooring catalogs can help you price out costs per material and area for easy calculating and budgeting. Measure out the area required in your rooms and multiply it times the price per area of flooring. This exercise will help you shop for the right flooring and will save you time and emotional stress! Wondering what is the right price to pay for flooring is? Angie’s list gives tips for choosing the right flooring based on price for your needs.

Choose flooring styles that fit your home’s lifestyle:

Once you’ve determined what you can afford, choose flooring that fits your family’s lifestyle. If you have several pets, children, and high traffic, you may want to stay away from high-end plush carpet and choose a resilient material to survive the wear and tear. While if your home has relatively low traffic and a higher-end aesthetic is desired, hardwood flooring or a thicker carpet could be perfect. Decide if your bedrooms should be treated separately from public areas. Whichever you decide, make your decision based on your own home, and not just from wishful thinking.

Consider DIY flooring ideas to save money:

The perfect flooring shouldn’t be a challenge to find. Take a look at these 5 DIY flooring options you may not have considered. For assistance with deciding, look to resources that show examples of tile, wood, carpet, laminate in various colors, qualities and price ranges. This will give you a well-rounded platform in which to work from. After all, your flooring may not be replaced for many years down the road, you will want to love it!

For more flooring options on Stagetecture, click here.

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