I love to decorate my porch for Halloween, and luckily enough I have a LOT of window space, so I always stick up gel decorations.
This year I was unable to pop to the shops to buy some more gel decorations, and I felt really sad about it as the shops are closed for the next few weeks due to the evil COVID-19 which means I would not be able to buy them before the 31st! 🙁
However, I love baking and I sometimes use gelatine as an ingredient in cake decorations. Gelatine is wonderful to work with as it turns liquids into solids, just like jelly! It can be quite sticky so it might just cling to a window. I grabbed some food colouring, and gelatine from my cupboard and set about making my own halloween decorations.
I only had red, blue and yellow food colouring but thankfully blue, red and yellow are primary colours. By mixing them together I was able to create green, dark purple and orange.
Originally, I had put my gelatine mixture into a big tray and poured the different colours into it but unfortunately they started to mix and created this brown colour! I learned my lesson from this failed experiment: separate the colours into different sections!
When I used separate containers, I put different colours into each container, and allowed them to set. Most Halloween gel decorations come in separate segments which you assemble when sticking them to the window, so having separate containers gives you the same effect!
After allowing the gel to set, I then set about cutting out my decorations. I had to freestyle it as I had no cookie cutters, but it made the shapes more interesting, and I could make them as creepy or as cute as I wanted to! 🙂 All you need is your imagination! 🙂
If they tear when you are cutting them do not worry, you can piece them together on the window, like my pumpkin below, I used two different coloured gels, cut them and stuck them together on the window.
Even though they aren’t perfect, I really feel proud because I made them! I think they fit in nicely with my other decorations, it’s hard to tell the difference! 🙂
After Halloween I can take them down and wrap them up in parchment paper for safe storage until next year!
Thanks to the solidifying properties of gelatine, I was able to create my own Halloween decorations, just in the nick of time!
Get ready for a Spooky Halloween with our Science Activities!
- Activity #1: Ghostly Expanding Balloons
- Activity #2: Window Gel Decorations
- Activity #3: Vampire Fake Blood
- Activity #4: Colour Changing Magic Potions
Sign up to our emails list to get your free experiment guides!
Make sure to take some photos when you finish the activities. These memories will live forever! I would love to see your creations too , you can share them with me using the link below.
Comment below! Which activity are you most excited to try or curious about?! I would love to hear about your Halloween celebrations this year.
Have a spooky Halloween 👻