November

Trying to get settled in after a month of 

being busy busy busy with Halloween.

Let's just say that I will not

be doing that for Thanksgiving.

At least not this year.

Before I forget, here is a picture of my costume - 

part of it anyway.

My sister complained that there wasn't a picture of me,

but I had already changed and then lost

the motivation to get back into it.

I blame it on the tights.

I was a witch.

I made this tutu with ribbons following the great

tutorial found here.

May I just say that is was SUPER EASY,

and I like it a lot more than the tying kind, although it still has the look of a no-sew tutu.

I wore some cutie pink and black striped tights, a black shirt, some

black knee-length leggings, and a black witch hat.

 

I love Halloween.

I also discovered my husband's requirements for costumes (finally),

so hopefully I will get something figured out for him next year.

 

Without further ado,

let's get on to this month's special things:

 

Banana Pudding Lovers Month...mmmmm!

 

Family Stories Month...good time

to work on your family history - especially to ask older family

members to recall their lives

International Drum Month - get banging!

Military Family Appreciation Month - so grateful

for families who have people who willingly serve in the military!

My husband just finished his Army National Guard career of 7 years.

I have mixed feelings about it, but we are happy he's out.

National Georgia Pecan Month - pecan pie would be delicious at

Thanksgiving!  We always have it at my in-laws,

although it's really Washington Nut Pie, since grandpa uses

walnuts instead of pecans.

It's just as delicious - but half the price to make.

Sweet Potato Awareness Month - are you aware?

And next week, we can enjoy:

Saxophone Day on Tuesday

I LOVE the sax - I played alto sax from

seventh grade through twelfth grade.

It's pretty much awesome.

Tuesday is also Election Day!

Don't forget to vote!!

It was a little strange to do that this weekend

and then drop our ballots in a mailbox.

It's not quite as fun,

but just as important.

Thursday is 

X-Ray Day.

Any suggestions on how to celebrate that?

I don't really want to have a family member need an x-ray.

Friday is

Domino Day

We have two types of domino games at our house.

Fairy Go Round Domino Game,

which the kids love...but shop around because

the price I saw on the link is way too high,

and the other is just a regular set of domino tiles.

But we usually play the Mexican Train way.

 

And Saturday, the 10th,

is the

United States Marine Corps Birthday.

Happy 237th to my brother Jakefoot!

So much to do.

The most important is probably to vote.

Don't forget!!

31 Days of Halloween, 28-31

Happy Halloween!

Isn't it crazy how soon the last few days before a holiday come

and then are suddenly gone?

Is it just me?

Day 28:

I took a break.

31 Days was pretty ambitious, and resting is important.

Day 29:

We made B-b bats in our preschool co-op,

which I'm in charge of for two weeks.

Good thing it's only 2 times a week!

Day 30:

Costumes!  I finished them yesterday

with 4 hours to spare before we went trunk or treating.

Day 31:

Halloween!

We hosted our preschool co-op Halloween party.

Here are some pictures of the treats that I made:

We made some ghosties out of a paper plate

and streamers, played Don't Eat Frank (find the free board and

instructions here), and played 

a small bingo game.

We had rice krispie treat pumpkins,

jell-o jiggler witch hats,

and witch brooms made from pretzels and string cheese (which were eaten 

before I remembered to take a picture).

31 Days of Halloween, 27

Day 27:

Ghost pancakes

Tonight for dinner, we ate pancakes

with chocolate chip eyes and a mouth.

When I filled the plate with the complete pancakes,

I made sure to put the top ones

face-side-down.

That way no one knew about it until I put one on the first plate.

The kids were shocked.

And ate them.

And loved them.

Are you wondering how the pumpkin bowling went?

Great.

The girls really enjoyed it.

If you listen closely near the end of the one
where my daughter scoots close up and pushes over the rest, you
can hear how much fun the baby had.
He laughed and laughed every time they all fell.
It surprised me that he was even paying attention.

31 Days of Halloween, 24-26

No pics, just a quick update of the latest 2 activities.

Day 24:

Leaf rubbings

We grabbed some leaves outside and brought them in,

stuck them under some paper,

and rubbed them with crayons.

The pictures ended up on the fridge.

Day 25:

I'll be working on the costumes tonight.

Day 26:

We will be pumpkin bowling.

Take a few rolls of toilet paper and stack in a small

triangle.  I think we will use 3.

Then we will use a small fake pumpkin to roll at the toilet paper

and try to knock them down.

I've got high hopes for a fun thing....we'll see.

31 Days of Halloween, 19 - 23

No excuses, but please forgive me for taking so long.

Day 19:

The kids and I had the car the other day while Daddy

was camping with the Scouts.

So we went to the home improvement store for some supplies.

On the way, we passed a sign that said free pumpkins.

I thought about stopping, but didn't.

Then we passed it again on the way home, and there were several adults

wearing costumes and flagging down passing cars to come

and get some free pumpkins.

So I turned around and had the girls each pick one.

They had to be small, since the baby was

in the car seat, and he's over 20 lbs (what a chunk!).

Here they are (I included a pencil in the picture so you could see the size):

Day 20 & 21:

Made sugar cookie dough, chilled it overnight.

Cut out cutie Halloween cookies.

Day 22:

Attempted to frost them using royal icing, so it would set and be so beautiful.

It was okay, but I wasn't very pleased with the results:

 Plus I kept dropping them on each other before the icing set,

so they were mainly turning out to be a big mess.

 Note to self - ice with buttercream.

Day 22:

Corn maze!

It was FREE!!  Woohoo!

Here we are at the end.

 Here we are when I lost my balance.  Luckily I caught myself and only my fingers

hit the mud.

Day 23:

Pumpkin patch.

It was a little more than we had expected to pay, having never been to one before.

They were 30 cents a pound.

But we only picked out two (thank goodness).

And while Daddy was paying, we found a big box of teeny pumpkins,

so the girls picked some up and we snapped a photo

'cause they are so cute!

31 Days of Halloween, 16 - 18

Happy National Chocolate Cupcake Day!!

These were delicious!

And so rich that I needed a glass of milk after eating one.

I'm SO glad I made these in mini size.

AND since I put them in

jack o'lantern wrappers, they are good for a day of Halloween.

Woohoo! for counting double.

 Day 16:

Chocolate cupcakes

Get this amazing recipe HERE.

Day 17

Milk Jug Jack O'Lanterns

Day 18:

Ghosties from garbage bags.

I used some mini white trash bags and balled up a

newspaper and then secured with white string.

31 Days of Halloween: 12 - 15

I know, I know, it's

FINALLY another post.

We had planned for one trip out of town this month, but

ended up having to go out of town again this last weekend.

So it's a catch-up kind of day again.

But it's a great one!

Here's the follow-up to Day 10, my

free Home Depot craft is finished.

 I kinda like it.

Day 12:

Mummify the front door.

After I looked at this picture, I added some

black eye balls, since I thought this was a little strange looking.

 

Day 13:

Paper pumpkins.

I used paper strips and small brads.

Day 14:

Tissue ghosts

Day 15:

ghost on the mirror

I cut out a ghost from some clear contact paper

and stuck it on the bathroom mirror downstairs.

So far, only my husband

has noticed it.

I saw this on pinterest, and the post suggested

that you use some cling wrap, but I don't buy that.

So I thought contact paper would work pretty good, and it did.

PLUS, I was able to draw out the image on the 

backing paper, which I'm not sure if cling wrap has that or not.

I'm still working on today's craft,

so I will have to post it tomorrow.

31 Days of Halloween: 9-11

Okay, here's the next three!

Day 9:
I made a banner for the mantle, which consists of
two pieces - the googly eyes on thread,
and some orange and white papers taped to some black ribbon.
Easy-peasy and cute.

 The whole look.

Day 10:
Last night, a friend and I went to
Home Depot to check out a new thing they are
doing at our store, a
FREE monthly craft night.
The craft last night was based on THIS PICTURE,
and here's how mine looks after last night.

 I'll be finishing it up today.
And post a finished picture later.

The craft night was pretty awesome - the four 2x4s were all
painted the base colors and drilled with holes,
because they are put together with dowels instead of screws.
And they provided more paint, markers, and some templates (I didn't use those).
Anything else that we wanted to have on it, we needed to bring it with us,
like gauze or material (or pink ribbon!) for the mummy.
You should check out if your Home Depot will be doing this, too - it was GREAT!!

Day 11:
That same friend brought me a piece
of her pumpkin cheesecake,
which I will enjoy as soon as I feed the baby.
I'm pretty excited because I could smell
the pumpkin as I was taking the picture - it took some restrain to
eat lunch first.

31 Days of Halloween, Days 3 - 8

Have you given up on me yet?

Sorry.

We went out of town for the weekend,

and I've been working on getting the house in order.

Even though we cleaned it pretty well before

we left, it's always a chore to get it cleaned up when we get home.

But, I have still been working on my 31 Days of Halloween.

Here's what I've done so far:

Day 3:

  Got out the decorations we already had

and decorated the downstairs.

 

Day 4:

 Printed out some Halloween cuties

and stuck them in frames, then added to the decor

from the day before.

You can find the subway art here, the witch here (available in 8 different colors),

and the say boo here.

Day 5:

 Printed and hung this free Trick or Treat banner.

You can find it here.

 Day 6:

 While we were at grandma's house, the girls

made some spooky haunted houses

with stickers inside the windows and doors.

Day 7:

 Then they made some bats out of circle heads with

pointy ears and tracing their hands for the wings.

Day 8:

 Of course we can't leave grandma's without

my sister painting the girls' nails.  One has candy corn

colors alternating on each finger and the

other has white with green and purple dots.

Or for a different candy corn approach,

see the toes below.  It's a mixture of what

the girls have, candy corn big toe and polka dots for the rest.

Super cute!

Thank you for the free printables to the blogs I linked to.

They have some great ideas, so be sure

to check them out.

31 Days of Halloween

I don't know about you, but I love Halloween.

It's fun to dress up, fun

to decorate the house, and fun to have trick-or-treaters come.

So to help the kids enjoy the festivities a little more,

and stretch out the celebration, I'm going to try

to do one thing for Halloween each day.

That doesn't mean it will happen, and the kids won't 

necessarily be involved in each activity,

so we will probably end up with a few more than 31 things total.

But it will be great!

Here are the first two things.

I found some free Ben & Jerry's printable skeletons,

which is why they have ice cream in their phalanges.

And I let the girls cut out and glue their own,

so they are looking really unique.

And the other is a graveyard for our annual

tombstones.

For everyone who comes to our house during October,

we have tried to remember to have them decorate a

small paper tombstone.

This is the first year that I have made a graveyard,

and I think it's pretty cute.  Since it's light outside, I had to take

a picture from inside - otherwise it was easier to see me in the reflection than

the graveyard in the window.

I'm pretty excited about it.

Do you have any traditions for Halloween?