Halloween (actually)!

I made a few costume modifications. You'll notice Charlie Brown got a haircut so he would look more bald-ish, and Snoopy got a nose. We tried to give Snoopy a black nose the first time, but the eyeliner we had for that one was really cheap and smeared too much to put on a baby.

Na Na Na Na Na Na Na Na BATMAN!

Every year it seems like I am rushing at the last minute to finish the Halloween costumes. This year, I swore, was going to be different. I was going to be finished well in advance so that I could enjoy the day at a nice leisurely pace. I need to stop swearing. This year I ended up being even further behind than usual (if possible). The drawback to finishing your kids' Halloween costumes as you are rushing out the door, is that it doesn't make for a very productive photo shoot. (The other drawback is that you forget things- like Catwoman's hood that was laying on the living room floor, instead of on her head for the Trunk-or-Treat). So please pardon the lack of professional photography- we were busy chasing superheros on Halloween. We also failed to get a family photo :(

Catwoman and Batman

Kitty as Catwoman, complete with Isis. I actually had most of her costume done ahead of time. She looks super cute with her Catwoman hood on as well. Batman's costume mostly materialized on Halloween day. The night before I whipped together his shirt, so by the time he left for school in the morning all he had to wear was a shirt and the mask which I made months ago. He added a different cape to wear to school, so while he was gone I sewed the pants, belt, gloves, boot covers, and cape. I actually have a hood for him, but he refuses to wear it. The black stocking cap was his idea.

Robin

Monkey made an adorable Robin. I had most of her costume made a week ago, and just had to make her cape and boots and mask. I couldn't find any more little kid gloves (the joys of living in an area where it is 87 degrees on Halloween night) so she went bare-fingered. Their trick-or-treat bags I was whipping out as we were running out the door.

 For this year's parental matching t-shirtness, we went as comic book pages. We thought they were fun, but I don't think many people noticed, or realized what they were. I was finishing them with only about 15 minutes to go before party time.

Hopefully I will be able to get better pictures when we go to get the family portrait done. Now I really need to clean my house. Let us just say that it looks like an explosion went off in a fabric store, and I need to go and sort through the rubble.

(a few more pics for you to enjoy)

It's the Great Pumpkin Chuck!

None of these are great pictures, we'll have to try for better ones tonight. I made the Sally dress (Simplicity 5695 view D)and bow and the Snoopy costume (McCall's Costumes 8938 view B with modification). For Linus and Charlie Brown we bought shirts from Target and my husband drew the lines on the red one with a fabric marker and cut out the zigzag on the yellow one from leftover fleece from Snoopy's costume which was then sewn on. I made Linus' blankie by squaring a yard of fabric and sewing them together, no batting, just two layers of cotton and then I embroidered the name "Linus" across it to hold it. We had to give Sally the layered clothes look for warmness.

Harry Potter Party

I was asked to make the cake for my friend's birthday party. We all dressed up and had a great time!

More Cinderella Decor

I like to look up other people's parties to get ideas. I then figure out the cheapest way I can imitate the ideas that I like. Want a tour?

The castle idea came from here. Don't look too closely at mine- I wasn't feeling very well the day I cut it out and didn't do the best job. I also never got around to adding the blue accents- it really was on my to do list, I just never made it that far. The Cinderella, Fairy Godmother, and mice paper crafts came from Disney here. I started the horses from there as well, but didn't finish them either. The cake platter original inspiration came from here. I took a dollar store plate and bowl and glued them together. Instead of the tutu ruffle I just did a bow. Time constraints once again were the culprit. The idea for the polly pocket cupcake doll on the cake came from here. 

I would show you the inspiration for the tablecloths, but apparently that site has gone private. The roses on the table? They are made with paper streamers (tutorial here). I was able to make two dozen roses for 50 cents (I bought a two pack of streamers at a dollar store and only used one roll).

 Walmart had the Cinderella party ware and stickers. That is also where I found the bubble wands.I just tied some ribbon to the top of them. I inserted plastic utensils into rings (also from the dollar store) for a little extra bling. The plastic "glass" slippers came from Amazon (here). 

 This Cinderella was a backup party activity. I had blue streamers to tape on her for a game of Pin the Dress on Cinderella. We ended up not having enough time to play that game, but it worked nicely as decor so it wasn't a loss. I just sketched a picture of Cinderella on a poster board (I googled coloring pages to find the image I liked), colored it, covered it in glitter, cut it out, and laminated it with contact paper.

 I decided that my house was going to be too small for all of the things that I wanted to accomplish so I moved part of the party outside. To add to the princess feel, I tied plastic tablecloths to the shade tent. You guessed it- they came from the dollar store too. I tied ribbon around the tablecloths. I brought out my son's train table and covered it with half a tablecloth for the activities. The other half of that tablecloth I wrapped around a box for a gift basket. For $5 in plastic tablecloths, I got shade and decor fit for a princess.

Here is a sneak peak at the chairs I had my husband build me for the party. I borrowed some of the little IKEA chairs from a friend, but needed more seating. Since I don't live close enough to IKEA to just run over and grab a few chairs, I designed some out of furring strips. I love those things. They turned out super cute, and very durable (I can sit on them), but they aren't quite finished yet. They were all assembled in time for the party, but still need to be sanded and stained and varnished. It might be a few months before they are fully completed.

Cinderella Party!

Kitty turned 4 recently. Since she is in the Princess stage of life and loves Cinderella, that is the theme we went with for her birthday party. I only had a couple of weeks to put this party together. There is much I would have liked to have done, but oh, well. Isn't that the way it always is?

For starters, the invitations:

I found a paper slipper pattern online here and had my sister change the colors in Photoshop to the blues and purples. They turned out perfectly. The invitations were printed on paper and turned into little scrolls (sorry, no close up of that, I was in a hurry to pass these out). The invitations read "Slip on over to my castle for a ball". I tried to find bouncy balls to put inside, but was unsuccessful with my time constraints, and so settled for creme pumpkins (which were also surprisingly hard to find). The rest of the invitation read: 

We've picked a date to celebrate

Our beautiful princess, ******* the Great

We can hardly wait, so save the date

There’s fun to be had at ********** Hall

So come one, come all to ********'s Ball

I painted this backdrop for my ballroom. Basically, it is a full sheet, folded in half and sewn up the sides. Then I turned some craft paint into spray paint (added water and stuck it in a spray bottle- old detangler spray bottles to be specific. Not perfect, but it worked). I did a rough painting of the castle, and stuck it on a PVC frame. The balloons at the bottom were suppose to resemble clouds.

This was me trying to get the little princesses to pose before the party.

This was my ballroom. Lots of streamers, a dot garland, and balloons. I debated taking down my Halloween decor but decided against it.

I was trying to come up with some Cinderella themed games to play. One of the ideas I came up with was a mouse hunt. I took Easter eggs, cut out some tape in the shape of shirts and hats, spray painted them brown, pulled off the tape, and added ears, eyes, whiskers, nose, and tail.

I filled them with Princess fruit snacks and hid them in the yard.

I shall post more later, but I have much cleaning to do still to make up for my two weeks of party preparations, so I shall leave you with the cake.

I covered a round cake with marshmallow fondant. I used some food spray to color it. The Cinderella on top is a polly pocket doll in a cupcake, skirt also out of the fondant. I added embellishments with buttercream frosting.