We are planning a big Halloween party this year! Our first one! I am SO excited!
I will admit that in the past I have not been a real big fan of Halloween (I like the cute pumpkins, but I can do without the blood and freaky masks.) I have always kind of seen the holiday as the final roadblock between me and Christmas.
However, this year we are going all out. When I say 'we' I mean for the most part my daughter and I. This is going to be her first 'teen' (even though the 'teen' part is still a year away) party - in the basement, with her own music, own decorations, own snack table, and no parents allowed, needless to say she is very much looking fwd. to it! Grown-ups and siblings are to say upstairs. I do expect a small child or two to wander down, but I would bet once they are hit with the music, strobe light and black lights, and the screams of a room full of pre-teen girls they will head back up to the calmer kiddie party up in the playroom pretty quick. (not to fear - we have plans for kids games, music, and snacks (and they get prizes!) all their own.
So, for the next month my blog will probably be pretty much Halloween party things. I still have to get into the habit of taking pictures of what I make. But I will try super-hard to remember to share my creations - and of course, just about everything is super cheap garage sale finds or home made!
Come back now and then to see what I have been up to, I have a little over a month to pull this thing together, wish me luck...........
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| My Husband's pumpkin - it's so awesome! (and don't worry, we didn't put the cigar in his mouth until AFTER the kids left the party!) |
The party was a success! There were kids of all ages running through my house like the sugar stuffed party goers they were, and I had such a wonderful time chatting with friends. We had a blast decorating and cooking. I did not get any pics of the kids though, such a bummer! (in truth they were moving to fast for any normal camera to capture them) So, here's a few pics....
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| As busy as we were pre-party we did make time to sit down at the table, mom, dad, and kids, and decorate our cookies - it's always so much fun to see what we each come up with. (look at the ghost, bottom right corner that my husband made - he's been egged! hahaha!) |
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| More of my husband's brilliance - Charlie Brown ghosts, both as himself, and dressed up as a ghost for tricks-or-treats. (that wonderful man STILL makes me laugh every day) |
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| highlighters opened up and placed in jars of water, with orange lights behind - they glowed awesome, but did not show up in the picture. |
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| A Pumpkin topiary - a nice tall candle holder (50 Cents at a garage sale) a Dollar Store foam pumpkin painted black, and a glittered pumpkin on top (25 cents) - all stuck together with a bamboo skewer (actually free at a garage sale this weekend) - glittered cut out shapes on the pictures, 90% off after last Halloween. |
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| Dead tree limbs from my parents backyard hung with fishing line from our second floor ledge to make an arch over our craft room entry. Halloween ornaments (from a garage sale) and black Christmas ornaments (75% off in January) hang from the tree. My daughter, husband, and parents think it's awesome - my son says a tree on the wall is just weird. |
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| Plastic spider rings with plastic gems glued on - scary and cute all at once - perfect! |
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| A close up of my grapevine snake wreath. I of course got the wreath at a garage sale (25 cents), but I had to go to the dollar store for a bag of rubber snakes. I glued the snakes onto the wreath, then hubby was sweet enough to go out and spray paint the whole thing black for me. For someone who does not like 'creepy' Halloween stuff I do love this wreath! |
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| I know, not a great picture, but with the close up above you get the idea. I am realizing as I blog more and more that I really do need a camera with a better zoom. Oh well, making do is what this blog is all about. I do have to give credit where credit is due and admit that the original idea for this wreath came from one of my old Martha Stewart magazines - you will see a lot of her influence in my Halloween decorations this year. (I bought a huge stack of her old magazines at a garage sale this summer.) |
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ugh - football season has started. Ok, I admit, I do root for my team(s) (happens when you move around a lot) and I do like hearing the games in the background, it truly means fall to me. But I am too much of a busy body to sit and watch game after game - so I usually do a craft or bake something. Last Sunday the kids and I got started on our Halloween party food - we made cut out sugar cookies and orange flavored shortbread (YUM - I will post the directions sometime, it's that good.) Both will go into the freezer undecorated, and will be ready for decorating a few days before our party. (I love when the hard part is done and the mess cleaned up, then all that is left is the fun part of decorating!)
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Halloween Banner - in the making
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| Home-made Halloween banner. We all walked around the Target Halloween displays over the weekend - and a banner cost five bucks! - NOOOO WAY! So, last night while my daughter was doing homework in the craft room I sat down across from her, pulled out some scrap paper, my cricut machine, and some art printed from the net - and this is what I have so far. |
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| I spent yesterday working on my Halloween banner - I had SO MUCH FUN that I actually expected to get into trouble for it somehow. I had so much fun that it felt wrong! I had to do some laundry in the background just so I could stop feeling so naughty. What a GREAT way to spend a cloudy afternoon. Still not done though- I'll keep the pictures commin' as I wrap it up. |
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| This is all done with stuff I already had - most important being my Cricut Halloween cartridge. I also raided my stash of beads, glitter, and some paper that is not actually marketed for Halloween, but the colors sure are right! |
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| These are done on paper, but are pretty heavy, next step is to cut out some foam core backings - guess where I got the foam core? - right you are! |
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| It actually felt really good to clear out my button and bead boxes - I have been hanging onto that stuff for years not knowing what to do with it - I still have a bunch left though - Christmas banner, anyone? |
Halloween Banner - part 3
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Getting closer to the end now- I went to the dollar store yesterday looking for some sort of decorative backing to put between my paper banner and the foam core backing that I am attaching for stability. I found this awesome "creepy cloth" - two packages did all of my banners and I have plenty left over for other Halloween projects.
I layered my items in order -
first a piece of foam core wrapped in gold Christmas paper. (so the back is pretty, too) (I hot-glued paper clips into the sides to be able to link the finished banner pieces together)
next, the "creepy cloth" - just roughly cut and attached with white glue
finally my banner papers - once again attached with white glue and pressed down with a roller. |
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| Paper-saving tip. My Cricut Halloween cartridge, "Chic and Scary" has a banner-cutting option, but I discovered at the size I wanted it would only cut one per piece of paper. So, I cut one out of scrap paper, then used it as a stencil to cut 2 banners our of each sheet of paper, and used it again to mark my foam core backing for cutting with a razor blade knife. |
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| I found this lamp at a garage sale last Friday. I got it for $2.00. Last night I carefully removed the plastic 'crystals' - I plan to use these between my banner pieces, and later, on my Christmas tree - how cool is that? |
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| Here it is - ALMOST done. This is just a few pieces of my Halloween Banner. I used paperclips to attach and hang the pieces. It's not a very clear picture, bad camera, sorry - I"ll hang it up on the fireplace mantle and get a few better shots in a day or two. I may tie ribbons, or 'creepy cloth', or beads, or hang my plastic 'crystals' between the pieces when I put the banner up for Halloween. But, for now, it's done enough to be packed away for a few weeks.......... until we meet again........... |
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| I couldn't find black paperclips - but got this bag of orange ones for a buck, then twisted them into triangle shapes. |
Here it is - my banner is all done and up on the fireplace. I really like it.
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| Our Fireplace has a nice big "box" on top - great for decorating. This was the perfect spot for our collection of fake pumpkins (gathered all through the summer - garage sales, of course). The backdrop is a piece of foam core that the kids covered for me in in ripped up paper grocery bags and applied with white glue (and they also applied the glue to the table, chairs, floor, and the cat's tail - but that is a story for another day.....) |
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| A close - up. That's old candy corn in a glass vase under one pumpkin (90% off at the end of last November), and the tall white pillar is the base of a lamp that no longer worked and that I took apart and glued a small circle onto, to use as a stand. |
I am re-posting this pic. below - just a decorating idea from a few years ago. - thought I would keep all of my Halloween pics. in one place.......
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| Our very own pumpkin patch with a combination of foam and ceramic pumpkins and home grown gourds sit on top of our fireplace. At first I scattered them around the house, but I thought they made a better impact all together, more festive, less total household clutter. |
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