Spooky Village DIY (With Printables!)

Our first Halloween with Nova, we started a tradition of making a spooky village. Each year, we add a couple more houses and buildings to our village. This year, we partnered with Canon USA to make a SPOOKY printable for you to use for your own village. This is a great project to do with kiddos, but as a self proclaimed “dollhouse person” I can attest that you don’t need little kids in your life to enjoy this project. It’s extremely fun for anyone who loves Halloween and crafting!

Download the free printables here!

I used my Canon PIXMA TS9521C printer on this project. I use it for crafts, paperwork, and photos and it can handle up to 12×12 prints— it’s great for big and small projects. I love the ability to print everything I need right at home. By the way, I printed this craft on regular printer paper. It would also work to use photo paper (my favorite Canon photo paper is Luster!), but for this craft it’s not necessary.

After you’ve printed out the PDF, the next step is to cut out each piece. I find it easier to do this all at once and have them pre-cut and ready for craft time.

You’ll need some wooden birdhouses. Craft stores usually have a good assortment of different shapes and sizes. Get a variety of shapes. You’ll also need some acrylic craft paint to paint them. The first year I made a bunch of houses, I found it helpful to do a sketch of different ideas before beginning. With little kids I suggest just “winging it” and letting them paint with spooky colors of their choice.

You can see below this little house that Nova painted. She chose purple and black. I love how our village has a combination of houses I clearly geeked out on and then ones that are obvious kiddo crafts—it’s a fun combination.

An old fashioned Mod Podge craft has my heart forever. I grew up using this stuff for EVERYTHING. Did you?

I prefer matte finish, by the way. It blends well with acrylic craft paint.

Here are a few photos of our spooky village with some new additions for 2020!

For the tall white house, all the bats and pumpkins are from the printable!

The green eyeball house is from last year and it’s one of my favorites.

I’m so excited to continue adding houses year after year! We’ll probably add one more for Goldie this year.

If you make this craft PLEASE tag us on IG so we can see. Thank you so much to Canon USA for partnering with us on this post. You’re the best! xx- Elsie

Credits//Author: Elsie Larson. Photography: Amber Kelly. Photos edited with A Color Story Desktop.