Mummy's Dinner Invitation

When your mom asks you to set the table, you do it. But when the queen of all mummies invites you to dinner, you accept the invitation immediately. Even if it means sitting down to your last meal!

The queen and her obedient servants have put together a delectable feast of potables and potions to die for. But before they let you know what’s on the menu, you must take a seat and have a drink of blood wine from the ancient tombs.

Enjoy!

As with all of my Halloween tablescapes, I reuse as much as I can from my existing collection of decorations—skeleton parts (from Target), gooey eyeballs... and I include items I find around my house—the black tray, two candle holders, black candles, a (dusty and broken) liquor decanter, black books, china, silver, crystal, and food dye.

Each year, I purchase one or two items, depending on the price, to add to my collection. The black candelabra is from Michael's as are the Styrofoam heads. In addition, I purchased several new packages of cheesecloth, which you can find at your local grocery store. It's a must-have Halloween staple. All totaled, I spent about $35.

I found the mummy's face on Pinterest. I copied and pasted the photo into a Word doc., and stretched the picture to the size that would fit on the face of the Styrofoam head. I glued it to the head using Mod Podge. I tried to make it as smooth as possible, but I don't mind the wrinkles.

I dyed the cheesecloth, I used on the mummy heads and as napkins, in coffee. I prefer coffee over tea because you get a much darker color. I simply added a ¼ cup of instant coffee grounds to 2 cups of water for every two pieces of cheesecloth. Once saturated, I quickly took it out of the heatproof bowl I soaked it in after it cooled a bit. Once I could handle it, I wrung out the liquid, then stretched the cloth along some fencing to dry.

Once the cloth was dry. I cut each piece in half and then I wrapped it around the Styrofoam heads securing it with twine as I went. I draped the fabric until I got the desired result I wanted making sure to wrap several pieces around each head. I used extra cheesecloth on the queen so I could drape it on the tray.

The blood wine is made from red-colored food dyed water with a touch of black. I (luckily) already had the black candles. They're actually quite old as I bought them at the Yankee Candle company at least twenty years ago. They're called Witches Brew and they smell heavenly. I'll light them once it gets closer to Halloween.

I used my good silver and china and some antique crystal goblets to give the whole scene a more regal look. I decided against using spider webs simply because I preferred the clean look, but you could certainly add them if you wanted to.

The trick to decorating for any holiday is to pick up odds and ends all year round. If you're decorating for Halloween, anything black will do. You can also find silver pieces for as little as $3 at second-hand stores. Don't be afraid to mix in the good stuff! I think it makes for a more interesting and authentic looking display.