The Flamingo

 We found this goofy flamingo hat at Dollar Tree last summer.  Right then & there, Elizabeth wanted to be a flamingo for Halloween.   I figured she could dress in pink with the hat & call it done.

Then I saw the bird wings tutorial on Prudent Baby... and I got ambitious. 

 Standing on one foot.

Yes, that was a time consuming project, but I have to admit... I love them... perhaps as much as she does.  And there had better be years of play left on those wings after Halloween!  : )

More Halloween

 Last week we made more Halloween decorations!  Some of the supplies came from Aunt Sissy's Box of Fun.

The kids enjoyed reading I'm the Scariest Thing in the Castle by Kevin Sherry,  so we made bats like the one in the book.  This is a great book to read with little ones.  It's not really scary at all... it's cute!

I did this a few weeks ago with my homeschool art classes- we made the giant squid from Kevin Sherry's book, I'm the Best Artist in the Ocean!  All the kids have enjoyed this project.  Idea from Deep Space Sparkle.

Next we used pipe cleaners & eyeballs to make spiders!

I looked at the cute press on nails that are out for Halloween & didn't want to spend the money, or they were in kids sizes.  So I decided just to do crazy nails with a monster eye.  Unfortunately, I lost half of my polish while trying to remove green Sharpie scribbles from my painted white kitchen cabinets.  I'll redo them this week, though.

Skeletons are not scary at our house.  After all, everyone has one!  We have a couple of skeletons that I picked up at Halloween time for homeschool purposes.  : )  Gotta learn how the body works, you know!  The kids really enjoyed making these Q-tip skeletons!  Idea from Boredom Busting Mommy.

Rebekah's skeleton is in purple.  Hers looks a little like it was in an accident!

Aunt Sissy's Box of Fun, Part 1

Last week we received a fun box that the sender called, "Aunt Sissy's Box of Fun!"  Aunt Sissy wanted to see what we might do with some of the stuff, so here's a peek at what we did this afternoon after our field trip to Legoland!

We made a pipe cleaner mustache and glasses.

Earlier in the week, we made white glue ghosts so today we stuck them on the glass.  Elizabeth's was made using a different type of glue and it all pulled into the middle instead of the shape that she drew.  So we went with that and just gave it lots of eyeballs to compensate for the strange shape. (Hey look, Sissy, you can see the dog through David's ghost's mouth!)

I made a little bunting out of the black pom-poms and the SPOOKY letters.

 

I also made a big black spider out of the pipe cleaners, but forgot to take a picture.  I guess that's ok, though, since Aunt Sissy and other aunts hate spiders.

Elizabeth has been drawing some jack-o-lanterns for decorations and I've got her flamingo wings in progress with one week remaining to finish her costume!

Halloween 2010

There's Rebekah's mummy pose a few days before Halloween:

And there's Rebekah stealing the apples out of my pretty fall centerpiece:

Now on to today!  I wasn't really planning on going, but Elizabeth got excited when she heard she could dress up and go to church tonight, so we went.

 Elizabeth as a Princess Butterfly

(same dress she wore last year!)

 Rebekah as a Ladybug

 The "Together" Shot

also featuring David without his astronaut costume

 Fly away little ladybug!

 She was sooo adorable!  

She enjoyed wearing the ladybug costume 

so much more than when Elizabeth was one.

The hood squished her little cheeks so that

she looked like an Ewok!

The kids had lots of fun playing games and getting candy at the church festival.  I had my hands full, especially when Rebekah got too hot in her ladybug jacket, Elizabeth gave me her pumpkin, I had my camera and water.  Thankfully Lauren offered to help with Rebekah!  Thank you, Lauren!!!

 Elizabeth digging for treasure

Playing something like musical chairs

Honest Abe (aka Grandpa) was there

 EB & Rebekah digging/playing in the sand, 

and the top of David's head in the other sandbox.

This is my kids' favorite stop every year!

 Her antenna got a little askew on the slide!
David was busy eating popcorn and drinking sprite at this point.

 Hot & tired Rebekah with her tattoo

 Elizabeth told the teenager who was painting faces 

that she wanted her whole face to be painted like a butterfly.
She might have overwhelmed the girl.

David opted for the tattoo.

Grana spins the wheel of fortune!

 I caught Lauren force feeding chocolate to Rebekah...

HA!!!

The kids got more candy this year than they did last year.  Perhaps they're finally getting the hang of this.  Rebekah & Lauren got a box of cupcakes at the cake walk.  Elizabeth got some toys in addition to her candy.  And David pretty much stuck to the candy.  All the way home, they were talking about what they got in their pumpkins and then, giggling, would add, "I got a rock," just like Charlie Brown.

You may have to click to enlarge this one - obviously, after it was all over, we had to have bath time!  Rebekah had cupcake & frosting all over her body and hair!  And Elizabeth went to bed with a still stained pink & purple face!  But it was fun!

The spider you are about to see is not real...

That disclaimer is specifically for the Aunts:  Aunt Sissy, Aunt Wee and Aunt Jana.  (Aunt Jana griped at me one time for not warning her that a spider picture was coming.)

Now... how cool is this?  I recently discovered that you can cut a paper spiderweb in the same method as a paper snowflake!!!  Why did I never think of this before?!?!

 Just to reassure that it is not real, here it is with the flash on:

Fake spider courtesy of a Halloween spider ring that the ring broke off of.

When I turned around from photographing the spider snowflake, Rebekah grinned really big and said, "CHEESE!!!"  So of course, I had to take her picture!

Automated Pumpkin Carving Machine

Party Time!

The weekend of Halloween is already busy and there's really not a whole lot you can go to that offers all natural treats, the kids & I decided to throw our own little Halloween Bash this year.  There's the spread - I made pizza, popcorn balls, pumpkin muffins, MawMaw made some yummy brownies, and we had little bags of pretzels and all-natural, organic suckers.  And I do not think my children were deprived in any way by not having Twix or Reeces.

David chose not to wear his costume.  He would have been hot.  His costume (in theory) is a Mars Mission Astronaut.  It's a Lego thing.

 

Elizabeth is a Butterfly Princess.

She informed me today that she needs antennae.

 Rebekah was just cute in a little orange striped, black cat shirt.

 The Kids

(minus Mason who arrived later)

 Isn't that the cutest little skeleton you've ever seen?

We had a pinata filled with Halloween pencils, Halloween note pads, spider rings, pumpkin erasers, balls, Halloween straws, more suckers, fake vampire teeth, fake tattoos... and I think that pinata was made out of concrete!

 The Butterfly Princess just barely wacked it.

 Grandpa targeted the opening in the back.

Always the strategic one...

 Cinderella enjoyed beating the thing!

 And David took out quite a few of his frustrations!

And I ended up just shaking all the stuff out on the ground for the kids.

Now we can use it again next year!!  hahaah...

 We also played a couple of games - a pumpkin treasure hunt and

Pin the Nose on the Pumpkin.

Our non-partial judge 

declared that David's nose was closest to the target!

Visiting around the table.
Grown-ups always end up around the food.
The kids were in the playhouse!

 I asked MawMaw to bring her brownies

 rather thin so that I could cut them with cookie cutters.

Don't they look cute!?

The kids both declared it to be a fun time, and that was the whole point.  So our first Halloween party was a success!  Maybe next year we'll have a hay ride, too!