Ten Ideas for Decorating Your Home for Halloween

Wazzup Pilipinas!

Are you excited about the spookiest night of the year? Perhaps you are planning a party. Maybe you are just considering giving some trick-or-treat kids a fright! We are here to help you make the most of this opportunity to be gruesome. Leading real estate portal MyProperty.ph has prepared 10 spooky tips for Halloween home decoration.

1. Innovative Pumpkin Carving

Look up some unique pumpkin carving designs. There are many techniques you can use to make your pumpkins look even spookier, such as moulding and drying wax onto them to create a scary lumpy texture, or creating different surfaces for the light to fall through. The uglier and more unique your pumpkins the better. You could even hang them on chains!

2. Orange Globe String Lights

Put orange globe string lights behind white blinds to give your home a spooky, orange glow. This is also useful for creating a backdrop for your silhouettes (see the next tip).

3. Spooky Silhouettes

Either make your own or purchase some black figures to place in front of your spookily lit windows… Skeletons, witches, ghosts, and ghouls are a great choice. How about a crazy scientist? Just make sure that they are positioned in terrifying poses.

4. Ominous Green Bottles of Poison

Fill up large jars with green liquid and line the entrance of your home with these terrifying bottles of poisonous doom. Place a cauldron in your kitchen and fill it with water and red food colouring to make it look like a witch’s cauldron of blood… Invite guests to stir the cauldron with an ominous wooden spoon; don’t forget to cackle (and to protect your surfaces!).

5. Ghosts Dancing Around a Campfire

Create some scarecrow-like figures for the garden and wrap them in white sheets… Stuff their heads so that they look like people. People will think they are ghosts! Place them in a circle, hand in hand. In the center of the circle, place a messy pile of orange and red LED lights, which are suitable for the outdoors. This will look like a bonfire. Enjoy the look on the faces of passers-by as they walk past a circle of dancing ghouls.

6. Front Garden Graveyard

Invest in some plastic headstones for Halloween… This is a fantastic way to decorate your outdoor space, and it does not cause too much mess.

7. Poison Ivy

How about draping artificial ivy around your dinner table, doorways, or mantle piece? Not only does this add greenery to your space during this fun holiday, it will also create a fun and poisonous look for your home.

8. Creepy Halloween Mirror

This one is a fantastic DIY tip to create a creepy home. Buy an old mirror from a garage sale or take a look in your own basement for an old creepy looking mirror that nobody uses. Find an old photograph or a printout of a scary face that is about the same size as your own. Purchase some steel wool, some transparent tape, some acetone, and find some paper towels. You will also probably need gloves, a screwdriver, and a cloth. With the steel wool, make the mirror look aged by scratching it. Take care not to strip off all the material. Fix the photo behind the glass, and you will have an eerie wall piece to scare all your indoor guests.

9. Spider Web Doorways

Either use cotton wool or a specially made spider web gun to create spooky spider webs in your doorways. You can even spruce up your webs with some realistic-looking plastic creepy crawlies. Just make sure that you and your guests can still get through the door and that you do not create a fire hazard!

10. Hold “Dark Dinner Night”

Nothing says creepy better than eating in the dark… Cover your windows with dark sheets and provide each of your dinner guests with a candle and a blindfold as they walk in. As your guests make their way to their seats with candles in hand, explain that you will serve them shortly, but that before you do, they must help their neighbour put a blindfold on so that everyone in the room is drenched in darkness for the entire evening. Make your guests food with interesting and unusual textures. You will give your guests a unique dining experience and make Halloween super memorable for them!

Have a spooky ghoulish Halloween!

Coding Hours to be Extended, “No Window Hours” Policy to be Expanded

Wazzup Pilipinas!

The Inter-agency Council on Traffic (i-Act) and the Metro Manila Council (MMC) have agreed to extend coding hours under the current Unified Vehicular Volume Reduction Program (UVVRP) or the Number Coding Scheme, as well as expand the coverage of the “no window hours” policy for coded vehicles.

From the existing 7AM to 7PM, coding hours will now run from 7AM to 8PM. Further, the “no window hours” scheme for coded vehicles shall also cover all radial roads (R1 to R10) and circumferential roads (C1 to C6) in Metro Manila. These measures shall take effect on November 1, or five days after publication of a Resolution signed by the Metro Manila Mayors.

The extended coding hours and expanded coverage of the “no window hours” policy are aimed to decongest traffic flow and reduce volume of vehicles on national roads in Metro Manila.

Today, the “no window hours” policy was implemented in EDSA, C5, Mandaluyong, Roxas Blvd., Alabang-Zapote Road, Las Piñas, and Makati. Metro Manila Mayors and traffic managers responded positively to the measure, paving the way for the expansion of the policy.

The affected Metro Manila roads for the “no window hours” policy are as follows:

C1: CM Recto to Padre Burgos Street

C2: Abad Santos to Quirino Avenue

C3: Libis Gocheco St. to Buendia

C4: EDSA

C5: Mindanao Avenue-NLEX to Sucat Road

C6: Bulacan-Rizal-Manila-Cavite Regional Expressway

R1: A. Bonifacio to A. Soriano Highway

R2: Taft Ave. to Tagaytay – Talisay Road

R3: SLEX to Southern Tagalog Artertial Road

R4: Pasig Line to Taytay Diversion Road

R5: V. Mapa  to Manila East Road

R6: Legarda to Marikina – Infanta Highway

R7: Lerma to San Jose del Monte – Norzagaray Road

R8: Quezon Blvd. to Rosario – Pugo Road

R9: Rizal Avenue to MacArthur Highway

R10: Tondo to Manila-Bataan Coastal Road


R1: Roxas Blvd.
R2: Taft Avenue
R3: SLEX
R4: Shaw Blvd.
R5: Ortigas Avenue
R6: Magsaysay Blvd./Aurora Blvd.
R7: Quezon Avenue/Commonweath Avenue
R8: A. Bonifacio Avenue
R9: Rizal Avenue
R10: Del Pan/Marcos Highway/MacArthur Highway

i-ACT and Metro Manila Mayors Agree on Unified Rates for Traffic Violations

Wazzup Pilipinas!

In a show of cooperation, national government agencies and Metro Manila mayors agreed to come up with a unified ticketing system for traffic violations.

In a special meeting of the Metro Manila Council (MMC) and Inter-agency Council on Traffic (i-ACT) earlier today, local chief executives committed to pass uniform ordinances on traffic violation fines and penalties. The MMDA, Land Transportation Office (LTO) and Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) also agreed to modify their rates.

This initiative is consistent with the government’s move to establish a single traffic authority through the i-ACT, which aims to centralize and solidify traffic enforcement in Metro Manila under one chain of command. Among the goals of the i-ACT is to get LGUs to eventually agree on a single ticketing system.

In the current set-up, the MMDA, LGUs, LTO, and LTFRB have different rates for different traffic violations. Apprehended motorists would have to pay different fines, depending on who flagged them and where.

Different agencies were able to come up with an agreement following a workshop conducted by the i-Act with LGU traffic managers last Friday.

This cooperation between the national government and the LGUs is seen as a positive move towards addressing traffic and transportation issues in the metropolis.