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Pink adults Halloween party drinks tray styling

Styling an adults-only Halloween party with Sainsbury’s Home

October 18, 2018

I admit it: since having children I haven’t been a huge fan of Halloween. Why? Let me present to you some of my with-kids Halloween moments from the past 8 years: 

  • Creating the world’s most reluctant pumpkin – my baby screamed from the second I dressed him in his ‘cute’ pumpkin outfit to the moment I removed him from the party

  • Coercing a trick-or-treating four-year-old to tell a joke in a stranger’s front room, only for him to burst into tears and scream, ‘I hate you all!’

  • Following his crying/shade-throwing, my offspring grabs handfuls of chocolate skulls before legging it at a speed impossible to match while dressed as an unraveling mummy

  • Bobbing for apples results in near-drowning

  • Man dressed as a ghost jumping out from behind a hedge is so scary I have to spend the rest of Halloween singing Christmas songs to calm my toddler down

  • The annual horror show resulting from two kids having eaten their body weight in sugar in approximately 10 minutes

How I sometimes feel about my kids on Halloween

How I sometimes feel about my kids on Halloween

This year, however, I’m determined to reclaim Halloween: why should the kids have all the fun? So instead of worrying about what outfits to dress them in, working out which houses are most likely to dole out spider-shaped Haribo, or wondering which apple variety is easiest to pick up with your teeth, I’ve teamed up with Sainsbury’s Home and used their excellent Halloween décor range to help me style up a scary drinks party at The Pink House, with absolutely NO kids allowed.

See bottom of the post for my Halloween party styling tips, plus click-through credits for the spooky Sainsbury’s Home stuff…Only here for the BOOS (as my black martini glass says, below)? You’ve come to the right Pink House…

Photos by Megan Taylor; pumpkin crafting by Martha Roberts

Sainsbury's Tu Pink witch costume and 'Only here for the Boo's' cocktail glass
Halloween drinks party with Sainsbury's styled in The Pink House
Glamorous Halloween party styling
Pink House Halloween drinks party
Halloween styled fireplace with pumpkins
Sainsbury's Halloween crow and pumpkins
Glamorous Halloween party styling with Sainsbury's Home
Glamorous Halloween party styling with Sainsbury's Home
Orange candles and black Sainsbury's candelabra for Halloween
No cats on this sofa at Halloween
White pumpkin with pink washi tape as a flower vase
Halloween drinks tray styling
Eat drink and be scary Halloween napkins from Sainsbury's Home
Sainsbury's Home bat chandelier mobile
Pink House Halloween
Painted multicoloured striped pumpkins
Stripy painted pumpkins in pink, orange and yellow
Emily Murray from The Pink House in a Sainsbury's Tu pink witch Halloween costume
Boo door decoration from Sainsbury's Home Halloween range
Farrow & Ball Nancy's Blushed pink front door with Beware sign
Sainsbury's Halloween cat decoration and studded pumpkin

My top 10 tips, tricks and treats for styling Halloween in YOUR home:

  1. Dress for the occasion – this will get you in the mood for some seriously scary fun – I couldn’t resist this pink sparkly witch outfit, accessorized with pink furry trick-or-treat bag in place of a handbag. The cat basket you see on my doorstep would happily hold your mobile for the evening too 

  2. Scare-way to Halloween heaven – prepare guests for their terrifying night ahead by hanging a hot pink ‘Beware’ door sign and another saying ‘Boo’, complete with gold glitter spider

  3. Create a frighteningly fabulous focal point – mine is the fireplace, which I festooned with glitter skulls and a glitter pumpkin. Add a spooky candelabra centerpiece filled with tea lights 

  4. Turn off your regular lights – and replace them with seasonal illuminations, such as the BOO lamp I styled alongside the BOOze selection (ha!), or a string of pumpkin lights . My central pendant lamp then became a place to hang this brilliant bat mobile (bat mobile! geddit!).

  5. Get some ghoulish glassware – I love these ‘I’m here for the BOOs’ cocktail glasses and these skull goblets

  6. Dress up your drinks tray – stripy straws, a pink flower-filled pumpkin (who says you can’t have a pink Halloween?) and some creepy coasters and you’re good to ghoul

  7. Choose wicked booze – my Halloween drinks selection includes a pumpkin-orange liqueur; a be-tentacled dark rum and blood-red port which guests spill on my Christopher Farr-upholstered sofa on pain of death

  8. Creepify your cushions – and petrify your prints; twist the words you see around you. My ‘Ain’t nobody got time for BAT’ cushion and ‘I think you are HORRIBLE’ perverted print help set the scary scene with just a black marker pen and a bit of tape

  9. Pimp those pumpkins – click HERE for more info on how the pumpkins you see here in The Pink House were created, and HERE for a pumpkin carving kit. Big thanks to my crafty friend Martha Roberts for all her help 

  10. Add after-dark animals – Sainsbury’s Home has a brilliant selection of creepy creatures. This large spider was too much for an arachnophobe like me, but I love the naughty tinsel cat (which paid no heed to my ‘No cats…’ cushion), and these small and large ravens. And don’t forget a glittery ghost – every good Halloween home should have one.

So there you have it – a haunted house perfect for a kid-free Halloween party!

This post was sponsored by Sainsbury’s Home - but as always, all opinions, thoughts, ideas and urges to drink blood orange martinis from glasses saying ‘I’m here for the BOOs’ are entirely my own.

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In Inside The Pink House, Living Rooms Tags Halloween, Seasonal, Not for kids, Bar, Drinks tray, Sainsbury's Home, Style it dark
← Pink House Helps...in the bathroomThe Pink House X hush →
Pinterest UK Awards 2019 shortlist
Winner Pinterest UK 17 Best Wow factor interior The Pink House bathroom
Amara Interior Blog Awards IBA16 Best Newcomer winner The Pink House
Best of Pinterest awards best use of colour 2017

"Fabulous family living!"

Emily Murray founder of The Pink House Living

"Hello! I’m Emily Murray, founder and editor of The Pink House. I’m a lifestyle journalist who has written and edited for loads of different publications, including Stylist, The Guardian, Grazia, Cosmopolitan, Conde Nast Traveller, Brides, and Mother & Baby. Here I am in the bricks-and-mortar Pink House in South East London, where I live with the Pink House Husband (PHH) and our two small, semi-feral boys. Our fabulous Christopher Farr sofa is covered in marker pen and chocolate, and the Eames rocker has a few suspicious stains. Come in and make yourself at home. No need to take your shoes off." 

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📚6-BOOK GIVEAWAY!📚 This is my bedroom as it appears in my book, Pink House Living ⚡️. If you‘re a lover of a luxurious coffee table book, complete with tactile cover and loads of interior inspo, how do you fancy winning not just my weighty tome, but a bundle of SIX beautiful interiors books, all published by @rylandpetersandsmall ? 
HOW TO ENTER:
📚Like this post
📚Follow @rylandpetersandsmall 📚Follow all 6 interiors authors:
@pinkhouseliving (that’s me!)
@lifeunstyled 
@myscandinavianhome 
@selinalake 
@pearllowe 
@rockettstgeorge *UK, European & US entrants only. Giveaway runs until 3rd July at midnight BST. Must be 18 years or older. Not affiliated with Instagram. Good luck!'*
📷: @susielowestudio for Pink House Living #pinkhouseliving
My FABULOUS new bespoke trapeze just arrived from @flingo.and.swollop and it’s giving me ALL the Glastonbury Festival feels (plus it would be PERFECT for a Pride parade 🏳️‍🌈). I’ve actually only been to Glastonbury once, in 2000, when I gatecrashed by climbing the fence with 8 similarly-wild, fun-loving boys and saw Bowie at his best (swipe to see me and Ziggy Stardust in my lounge 20 years later⚡️👩🏻‍🎤) and had a mind-blowingly brilliant weekend. I’ve never felt the need to return since because I can’t believe that weekend could ever be bettered. Plus I’ve no chance of gatecrashing now...😉😂 Here’s to you Glastonbury and David Bowie - thank you for giving me one of the best weekends of my life 🍻. OUTFIT: My incredible suit is an AD/gift from super-talented costume designer Abby @flingo.and.swollop who specialises in creating fantastic outfits for adults and kids (DM her for bespoke or check out her Etsy shop via the link in her bio.) T
We sacked off home school and went to Whitstable for the day. It was glorious. I swam in the sea, ate oysters (though not from this #pinkpilgrimage destination sadly as Wheelers isn’t open on Tuesdays), watched my son gleefully throw stones into the water, took cliched beach hut photos and generally enjoyed not thinking AT ALL about adverbs or missing numbers. Might do it all again tomorrow. Highlights on stories. 🦪 (yes there’s an oyster emoji) #skivingschool #pinkhousetravels
🍾I now declare The Pink House Deck officially...OPEN! Swipe for mini tour and see stories/Garden highlight in bio for last night’s deck launch party details, including my attempt at becoming the Athena poster tennis girl 🎾, and what happens when you try to reenact the ‘Jack I’m flying’ scene in Titanic while tipsy on a swing 🤪. Excuse me while I help myself to a very strong coffee and a few more hours in bed. What Father’s Day?! 😅 💖With thanks to my excellent guests @sarahannmacklin @tommacklin @jackmrhughes @fraserbelk 💖#PinkHousegarden #pinkhouseparty #pinkhousewine
10 FACTS ABOUT ME My mum called me yesterday from Edinburgh to say her old school friend, who now lives in the US and follows me on Instagram, had contacted her to ask if I was ok, as she “hadn’t seen you on Instagram for about a week!” That’s when I realised some of you might actually be wondering where/how I was. I’m fine thanks! I just decided I could do with a bit of a digital detox and some more time to spend teaching my 7-year-old how to spell ‘special measures’. It’s been lovely 🤪. Anyway, here I am again – hello! And to celebrate my IG week off – and the reaching of 80k followers which I’m struggling to comprehend; a huge THANK YOU for all your support! – I thought I’d respond to my friend @jadelovejoy ‘s exhortation to share some fun facts about myself. She did 20 (and they’re BRILLIANT – go have a read), but I think, due to my propensity to be rather long-winded, that I’ll s
🥂Sweetie dahling! 🥂I’m proud to be working with @johnlewisandpartners and the @britishfashioncouncil to share my (rather unconventional 🤸🏼) catwalk moment and support the very first digital-only, gender-neutral London Fashion Week! Swipe to see Coco the kitten slinking in the back gate to take her place in the FROW – it is a CAT walk after all! For some behind-the-scenes action head to my stories...
The #LFWCatwalkChallenge was created by John Lewis and the @britishfashioncouncil to raise money for the BFC Foundation Fashion Fund for the Covid 19 Crisis, supporting the future of fashion and design talent in the UK.
And here’s how you can take part too:
1) Chuck on an outfit that brings you joy (I’m giving it kooky cowboy here in pink sequins, plus a Somerset by Alice Temperley leather jacket and cartwheel-friendly AND.OR studded boots, both from John Lewis)
2) Strut your stuff in your home or garden and upload the short video to your grid or stories
3) Inclu
💖PINK DECK DEBUT!💖
Who needs foreign holidays? 😬 If you’re looking for me this summer I’ll be chilling out here with socially distanced friends and a bottle of pink fizz, ignoring small person pleas for ‘just one more ice cream’. Hopefully there will be a bit more sun than you see in this shot...☀️🤞🏻
There’s still more deck decor (deckor?) to add, including the festoon lighting (the Pink House Husband is still sorting the electrics #whatcouldpossiblygowrong ⚡️😅), a shelf to hold pots of herbs, more plants-in-pretty-planters and the odd additional accessory, just to piss off clutter-fearing PHH 😉. Plus I need to wait patiently 😂 for the grape vine in the far right corner to grow up and over the frame. Pink House Wine anyone? 🍇🍷 (they definitely need to get that rosé emoji sorted stat.)
Speaking of debuts, tomorrow this deck will set the scene for my very first catwalk (complete with actual cat in the FROW 🐈). This sashay will be part of a
💖PINK LADY💖 I’ve been on many wonderfully colourful Instagram journeys over the last few days, discovering gorgeous accounts belonging to creatives from a diverse range of backgrounds. I found this beautiful artwork by über-talented fellow pink-lover @bygracelynne while searching the squares for accessories for my new pink garden decking - swipe to see the delicious @concrete__candy planter I unearthed at @w.a.greenlondon 💖 (pics of new decking coming v soon!). I firmly believe that the combination of following your passion while staying playfully curious is the best way to find people from all backgrounds who share that passion. This way we can come together to make real connections with solid foundations that benefit everyone within the creative community and beyond. 💖#amplifymelanatedvoices #diversityyourfeed #blacklivesmatter
I hereby pledge to use my white privilege - and any other privileges I enjoy - to stop being part of the diversity problem and start becoming part of the solution. The lack of diversity in the interiors industry is shocking. Things must change, and they must change NOW. Here are just some of the things I will be doing from now on to help effect that change:
🖤Only working with brands and businesses who can satisfactorily prove they are anti-racist and working with a diverse range of creators
🖤Only accepting an invite to a press or influencer event if the guest list is suitably inclusive
🖤Only speaking on inclusive, diverse panels 🖤Actively interviewing or sharing the work of many more people with different backgrounds and experiences to my own (this started in my last post)
🖤Ensuring that all events I host here at The Pink House – or anywhere else – have an inclusive guest list (and plenty of pink fizz 😉)
To all my BAME followers: I’m sorry I didn’t do all
As part of the work I’m doing to be actively anti-racist and diversify my account, I spent time today and yesterday researching non-white interior designers and influencers. Along the way I was reminded of some incredible creatives I already follow but whose posts rarely appear in my feed. I also discovered other wonderfully talented designers in the UK and USA whose work makes my heart sing 💖. Swipe for just a few of my favourites...And please rest assured this isn’t a token gesture - over the past few days my eyes have been opened to the lack of diversity in the interiors industry - and the part I need to play to remedy this - so I’ll be doing more to champion and share the work of black, Asian and ethnic minority designers, small business owners and influencers from now on. 🖤💖 📷: Images courtesy of @aphrochic @hillhousevintage @justinablakeney @rightmeetsleftinteriordesign @revampnyc @jazzierere 
#diversifyyourfeed #diversitymatters #blacklivesmatter #diversity

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