Halloween decor on the cheap

I love having a buffet in my dining room, I feel like every dining room needs one. I found this one at the Salvation Army for $100, which is more then I like to spend on furniture but you can't always find buffets for less then that. Either way, it was still a great deal. 

The top was messed up and there were some problems with the finish, so I painted it, and then I painted it again. You can see the before HERE when I redid it for the Fab Furniture Flippin' Contest. 

I love using a buffet for extra storage, food for parties, and an extra surface for decorating. I had some of the things you see pictured already, but I bought almost everything else from the dollar store. Yes, you heard me right. I said the dollar store. 

The milk crate holds wine bottle (although it never stays full) and the silver stuff I got from a thrift store. But the flowers, spiders and pumpkins I got from the dollar store. I painted them last year and added glitter to the spiders but I notice this year they had some already glittered. I even got the fake air plant from the dollar store, but I took it out of the ugly plastic container and put it in an old silver creamer. I got all the spooky fabric from the dollar store as well. 

I got the stuff on the silver tray and the silver tray from either a yard sale or a thrift store. I got the stickers from a craft store to create old bottles with spooky ingredients. 

The bottle was actually a beer bottle I saved. I love the one that says beetle juice, its my favorite. My kids have never seen the movie though. I guess I will have to fix that! 

I LOVE how my table turned out too. Almost everything on was either thrifted or came from the dollar store. Oh, except the table runner. I still got a good deal on it, I think I paid about $3 for it. 

For the place settings, I used a set of gold metal chargers I got at a thrift store. I layered it with clear plates I got from the dollar store and white milk glass plates that came from a flea market. On top of that, I used some monograms napkins I have had forever with napkins rings from Hobby Lobby that have a little bling in them. Remember the air plant I showed you earlier? I also got a few succulents and spray painted the container gold. If you wanted, you could take it a step further and stick in a name tag for each person to personalize the table setting. 

I think that people take for granted the custom of sitting down at a table and eating dinner with family and friends. I am trying to make it a point to set my table and make eating dinner a time for family and talking, even on regular weeknights. It does not always have to be a special occasion to set a table, but it doesn't necessarily have to be elaborate either. I'm making it a point to start making my kids help me set the table every night for dinner, so we can sit down and eat dinner together as a family with the TV off. 

Now that Halloween is over, and Thanksgiving is this week, I'm very excited to start decorating for my favorite time of year! I love Christmas and I always have a hard time figuring out how I want to decorate because I have so many ideas. I'm hoping to share several with you over the next few weeks. What is your favorite holiday to decorate for?