Halloween things to make, listen to, play and decorate your nails with

Here are the things that have caught my eye this Halloween:

FOOD

Eyeball on a brownie created by Christine McConnell. She’s made a candy eye look so much more threatening than simple sugar. Also take a look a the other treats she created. And the house she decorated. And basically everything else she’s done, it’s stunning.

Prosciutto Wands at Martha Stewart. I first encountered these back in the summer but they instantly made me think of Halloween. Very simple and easy to interpret as ghastly when set on a darkly decorated table.

Bleeding Heart Cake (video) by Ann Reardon at How To Cook That. This is a recreation of a cake in a Taylor Swift video but this entirely edible construction for holding hidden goo until you cut into it deserves to be used for Halloween.

Halloween Witch Hat Surprise Cookies at It’s Always Autumn. Easy to make and very cute, bonus points for mixing some candy eyes in with the other treats inside.

NAILS

Creepy 3D Ghost Face tutorial from PiggieLuv (video). This uses gel polish built up in layers, creepy. Via this Halloween nail art round up at Brit+Co.

Halloween DIY Googly Eye Manicure at Design*Sponge. Silly and simple. If you’d like something even simpler take a look at the VandalEyes nail stickers at Espionage Cosmetics, both types glow in the dark!

GAMES

Dark Echo. You can’t see the monsters but you can hear them. I played a demo of this at PAX this year and even standing in a large room filled with people I was frightened when I would finally encounter something that was stalking me. (Mobile on the App Store, Google Play, Amazon Apps and on Steam.)

Spider: Rite of the Shrouded Moon. This is the second Spider game and this one is larger and tells a much darker story. You maneuver a spider around an estate and it’s grounds and find clues as you explore. If spiders freak you out you can play as a tiny walrus instead, which is hilarious. (Available in the App Store, Google Play, Humble Store and Steam, later for Vita and PS4.)

LISTEN TO

All In Your Head at the 99% Invisible podcast. They detail how the sound designer behind the television show Hannibal made sounds that make us uneasy.

Caitlin Doughty of Ask A Mortician on the Explain Things To Me podcast. A great interview on how she got started in the death business, how embalming became common and what she wants done with her body when she dies. Also listen: Another interview on the Nerdette podcast.

Charles Manson’s Hollywood, a twelve part series on the You Must Remember This podcast. Karina Longworth follows the series of events and the who, how and what sort of society of the time led to the Manson murders. There is meticulous research and in depth stories of the people surrounding Manson’s time in LA. It’s worth looking at the webpage for each episode to see photographs from the time.

Two Halloween playlists for your party needs: at Oh Happy Day and the Marloween 2015 at The Amber Show.

QUESTION FOR YOU

Has anybody tried those lace temporary tattoo masks? Do they stay on for the duration of an evening? I want to try out the various temporary tattoos that are out for Halloween (zombie bites, spiders, masks) but I’m afraid they would flake away after only an hour or so.

· comments [7] · 10-20-2015 · categories:halloween ·

7 responses so far ↓

1 Ali // Oct 20, 2015 at 8:16 am

You are full of great links! I’ve never heard of the tattoo masks before now, but I am skeptical too since temporary tattoos usually work best on a flat surface. I would be afraid they would wrinkle or tear on bumpy surfaces like around your eyes.

How do you think you would make the eyeball brownies? Maybe ganache for the eyelid parts and candy melts for the eyeball?
2 megan // Oct 20, 2015 at 8:32 am

Ali – I played around with a few temporary tattoos recently and the one I put on my neck wore off in a few hours but the one on my arm stayed for days. I might try a face one and see how well it works.
3 KC // Oct 20, 2015 at 9:25 am

Re: temp tattoos, part of it can be skin prep, but part of it is just… your face produces more oils and stuff than your arm (generally, anyway), and then there’s the question of sweat and friction and stretch (which is probably where your neck exceeded the capacity of the tattoo). But each of these varies by person, so there’s that. Might be worth treating half your face differently for the test – cleaning both sides down, but applying moisturizer to one side and not the other and see which hold the tattoo longer. I could see arguments running each way (no moisturizer: can bond to skin better; moisturizer: keeps tattoo supple and less likely to be affected by skin shifting during smiling, etc.), and would be really curious!

I would guess, but am not sure, that toner also might help the tattoo stick around longer – we use alcohol wipes to prep the skin surface before medical adhesives (even when it doesn’t need to be sterile), so maybe alcohol-based toner would also help remove impediments to skin attachment?

For “how much does this bit of skin stretch and wrinkle” questions, you can put a strip of masking tape in “likely locations” and then move around; you’ll be able to feel when it’s being tugged and squashed up. Some parts of the arm skin are *surprisingly* not stretched much, but other bits are constantly in flux.

Hope you have fun!
4 megan // Oct 20, 2015 at 9:56 am

Thanks KC! I did indeed apply sunscreen to my neck but not my arm that day. I like the side by side comparison, I have a new experiment!
5 LauraVW // Oct 23, 2015 at 9:25 am

I’m so pleased that there is a new spider game! Thanks for making me aware of it – I really enjoyed the last one.
6 megan // Oct 23, 2015 at 11:41 am

Laura – The second Spider game has been studied on some game sites I follow because in the three years since the last one the way mobile games get press/announcements out has changed while at the same time people are less willing to part with $4.99. It’s a shame, the game is a nice follow up with larger areas and day/night/seasonal changes on each level. And it kept me very happily distracted on a long flight.
7 DesignWorld // Oct 25, 2015 at 8:39 am

Great idea with the nails! You should watch this video with 3D-printed nails: https://www.designworld.se/2015/05/11/3d-utskrivna-naglar-far-liv-med-animeringsteknik/
It will give you a lot of ideas :)