DIY Fortune Telling Booth

In the 90s, my parents were the fortune tellers at our elementary school carnival (Spooky Saturday) for 7 years. Even the year they didn't have a kid at the school, they never abdicated their positions. To this day, I still get comments from friends and acquaintances fondly remembering their performance because they really gave it their all. 

The refrigerator box that was used as their makeshift booth lasted such a long time. I was probably around 5 when they started doing that, and when I volunteered at the carnival in high school, they were STILL USING IT. It was honestly impressive it held up that long.

So when the opportunity to make another fortune telling booth came around in the form of a washer/dryer box, I had to take the chance. 

My husband and I started by spray painting the box black - and we got the cheapest black spray paint at Lowe's and discovered why it's so cheap. It was the worst. I would not recommend it for a project this big. This paint was good for small projects I came up with around the house, but for something of this magnitude, I would advocate for just using wall paint and rolling it on the box. We wore two masks and goggles and still inhaled that cheap paint, and I think rolling it on would have been better for our lungs and brain cells. 

Because of our approach, it took a long time to get it to a place where the previous branding wasn't showing through. We could have saved so much time if we didn't paint that way, but it's easier to say it now, being on the other side of it. Once we were finished, we cut an opening in the back so we could get in and out easily, and we cut a window in the front.

I spent entirely too long looking at inspiration on Pinterest for this booth. I decided I wanted to try for a 1920s celestial look mainly because I wanted to wear a 1920s headpiece. I found an example that seemed doable for me to do freehand and got started. Fun fact: the moon and sun are traced from our garbage can lid to get the perfect circle :) 

Then I added the text to the front of the booth. I initially tried to freehand that too, but it immediately proved to be difficult - my letters weren't even and it looked sloppy. I decided to use the Cricut Maker to cut some stencils in a font I'd like. I actually wanted something that looked more medieval, but I couldn't find anything so I settled for something a bit more modern. I'm glad I did the letters this way because it looks so clean and uniform. 

It's kind of hard to see, but I did add command hooks to the roof of the booth and strung a string of purple lights on the inside. I'll have to go back and modify that next year because it wasn't really apparent there was that purple glow in there. 

However, the green lights from the crystal ball worked out very well. I got the "crystal ball" from the thrift store - it's actually a plant terrarium, and drilled a hole in the bottom for the lights to go through. Because both my husband and I didn't fit in the booth, we put a table in there, covered it with a silver scarf, and let the crystal ball take center stage in the booth while we sat outside passing out candy. 

I'll be honest, this craft kind of felt like a pain in the process of doing it. I think because I was worried we wouldn't even get to use it since there's always a chance of rain on Halloween in the Midwest. My husband even said I didn't have to keep knocking myself out trying to get it done, but I figured I was so close I need to finish it. I'm also proud that this entire year, I've done everything I've set out to do. I haven't bought any materials and just let them sit around - they're getting used regularly. 

In the end, it did not rain on Halloween. It was actually probably the nicest Halloween in recent memory. It was sunny and warm during the day and only slightly chilly at night. Because it was dry, we left the booth out all day long so people could see it. 

I wanted to contribute something a little extra to the neighborhood for Halloween and I think even though it felt a little more arduous with this craft, it was worth it in the end. It was also fun to see other neighbors sitting outside waiting to pass out candy along with us - something we haven't really seen in the past couple of years. Hopefully, this booth lasts as long as the elementary school one and we can use it for years to come.