Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everyone! Costumes? Candy? This is seriously one of my favorite holidays! Being 6 months pregnant, sore, and exhausted has made me tone things down quite a bit this year so we skipped hosting our usual Halloween party and didn’t do a family theme costume.*

I did put together a costume for Wesley though! He’s still a little young to fully understand Halloween so I wasn’t really able to get an answer to a general “what do you want to dress up as” question.  He has been more interested in dinosaurs and dragons lately so I asked him if he wanted to be a dinosaur or dragon and he happily replied “Dinosaur dragon!” Yeah, ok kid we’re just gonna pick one since a dragon is more or less a dinosaur with wings. Later he changed it to dragonfly (which I still came up with a plan for) then changed back to dragon before I got started on anything.

Yup, kiddo has a hoodie on under a hoodie.  That’s a Minnesota Halloween for you…actually given that he didn’t need a snow suit it was pretty warm Halloween. I put on a jacket as soon as we had snapped this picture.

They did some Trick-or-Treating at daycare and then we took him down the block later in the evening.  I wasn’t sure what he would think of it, but he LOVED it!  He even got pretty good at saying “Trick or Treat!” and “Thank you!”… with a bit of prompting.

His costume was pretty simple to put together since it was just a hoodie with a bunch of stuff sewn onto it.

Step 1: Plan your design

For a dragon costume, I wanted spikes running down the back, a tail with spikes, wings, and a contrasting belly patch.  I figured I could easily put it together with a few sheets of felt and some jersey that matched the hoodie.

Step 2: Get Distracted by all the awesome costume fabrics

I went to Joann’s to pick up some jersey and felt…. but then I saw all the amazing, shiny, costume fabrics they had out for Halloween. I found a scaley pattern that didn’t seem to fray and a coordinating iridescent fabric that I figured I could just glue onto felt for the spikes. I wasn’t deviating that much from the plan, just a little extra gluing.  Easy-peasy, right?

Step 3: Immediately regret your life choices

Wrong. The damn iridescent fabric proved impossible to glue. It was also an acetate sort of fabric, so iron-on adhesive or stabilizer was out because there was a good chance of melting.  I briefly considering sewing triangles for the spikes out of a few layers of the shiny fabric, but that would have been a PITA as well.

Step 4: Cut your losses, return to your original Plan

Back to Joann’s I went… for the felt I originally planned on.  I got 2 sheets of a stiffer green felt for the spikes and wings, 2 sheets of a contrasting standard felt for the belly and underside of the tail, and 1 sheet of black adhesive felt for some contrasting details (wing bones and belly scales). I lucked out and found a pack of super-awesome stick-on dragon eyes, but you could use large googly eyes, or even some black and white felt.

From there I cut out some pretty basic shapes and hand sewed everything to the hoodie. If you want to make it even easier you could glue everything (although I’m not sure how well that would work for the spikes) or use an iron-on adhesive (ditto). The tail consists of 3 triangles (2 gray, 1 green to match the belly color). Spikes got sandwiched between the gray pieces and all 3 triangles were sewn together to make a cone shape.

My “costume” was even easier.  My original plan was bust out my brand spankin new Cricut and cut the dragon embryo design out of glow in the dark vinyl (nothing iron-on since I wanted to be able to peel it off the shirt later). Well, time got away from me so I ended up printing the pattern on full-sheet label paper I already had on hand and sticking it to my shirt. It’s not super solid, but it got me around the block.

 

* Matt may be thankful for the last part

Happy Halloween!

I’m all about the Halloween group costume.  Last year we did Peanuts and this year I nerded it up big time! Let’s just say when you’re a nerd and your son is named Wesley, this costume is practically mandatory.

And for the non-nerds out there, no, we’re not the family from the Incredibles. We’re not anyone from Star Wars.* Nope, this costume is straight-up Star Trek: The Next Generation.

via Ex Astris Scientia

Matt makes a pretty awesome Picard, Wesley’s the cutest little Crusher on the planet (#momBias), and I’m supposed to be Beverly Crusher, I just don’t have the hair for it.

Let’s take a closer look at Wesley’s iconic ugly sweater, shall we?

If you really want to be technical, the bottom stripe is supposed to be more tealy-blue, but I DIYed this puppy on the cheap so my options were limited.

I think my son only smiles when he has a stick (then bawls when I don’t let him bring sticks into the house).

Our daycare’s Halloween Party was today, and apparently once his teacher said “Wesley Crusher from Star Trek” there was even some recognition (so I think they would have gotten it if they had seen us all together).  We went to Halloween/Birthday party over the weekend and only 1 person there got it. #nerdProblems

 

*These were all actual guesses. I also had a co-worker ask what we were doing for Halloween.  When I responded that I had a Star Trek family costume planned, she asked if Wesley was going to be the “bear thing.” My new tagline may be “May the force be so Number One.”

Happy Halloween!

Have I ever mentioned Halloween is possibly my favorite holiday? I’m not into horror movies or haunted houses, but costumes + candy? Count me in!

Now that we have Welsey in our lives, we decided to rock the full family theme costume. Matt is a huge Charles Schultz fan (and St Paul happens to be his home town) so we went with a Peanuts theme.

Oh my god, it is so hard to get a good picture of everyone when there’s a baby involved….

One of the best things about this group of costumes is that it is super simple (and cheap!) to throw together. Plus, you can easily mix-and-match characters depending on kids and genders. We chose to go with Charlie Brown, Linus, and Lucy.  Matt thought I should be Marcie (because glasses), but she’s less iconic* and would probably work much better if you had someone dressed as Peppermint Patty.

If I was a good blogger, I would have had our costumes done a month ago, and a DIY post up in early October, but I am nothing if not a procrastinator.  Seriously, I’m just impressed I wasn’t still finishing them up on Halloween. I did take some pictures will working on them though, so I’ll have a DIY post up next year…. and hopefully a whole new set of last minute costumes shared on Halloween (we’re tentatively planning Star Trek for next year–Wesley Crusher, Beverly Crusher, and Picard).

 

*Even as Lucy I think only one person at the office knew who I was supposed to be.  I even had a “Psychiatric Help 5[cents]” sign up at my cube. Keep in mind, St Paul has sculptures of the Peanuts characters EVERYWHERE. My boss thought I had just bought a new dress, because apparently wearing a bow on your ass is totally trending as everyday wear….

 

Happy Halloween!

As a follow up to my #lazygirl fall/Halloween decor round-up I thought I’d share how I decked out our house for Saturday’s party.

halloween1

I cut zombie hands out of black poster board and taped them to the porch windows.  Then I tacked up some “creepy cloth” I picked up from dollar store (I had another idea in mind for it at first so didn’t buy enough for the porch so it looks a little wussy… next year I’ll pick up a bunch of cheesecloth instead) and topped it with some Halloween lights I got on sale at Joann’s.

  • Poster board: 50 cents
  • Cloth: $1
  • Lights: $6

Total: $7.50

 

halloween2

I didn’t do much in the entryway.  I was sooo tempted to try the floating candle ceiling, but I opted for sanity this year.  Instead I found that awesome skull candle holder on clearance at Michaels since it was “broken.” I added an LED tealight (love these instead of open flames).

  • Skull candle holder: $3.50
  • Tealight: $1

Total: $4.50

 

halloween3

I put more effort in the bar because booze.  I topped it with a leaf garland (Micheals) and a battery powered string of wire globe lights (Target).  For a festive Halloween flair I painted  laser cut craft wood pieces from Michaels and hung them from the top shelf.

  • Leaf garland: $3
  • Lights: $3
  • Halloween cutouts: $1.50

Total: $7.50

 

halloween4

And of course, the food spread. It’s lacking in food in the picture because the cats would go after anything unguarded so we had to wait until the very last second to put anything out. Schmutz still managed to make off with a tortilla chip and Spencer pilfered a turkey-cheese pinwheel that some of our guests brought.  The tablecloth I picked up wasn’t labeled and ended up being round instead of rectangular.  Oops. The pumpkin bucket was from target and cage-like candle holders were more Michaels clearance (they’ve got all their fall stuff at 70% BEFORE Halloween).

halloween5The bookcases flanking the table got a general fall treatment that will get left up through Thanksgiving. The gourds were from Target and moss vase filler were all from the dollar store.  The garlands were more Michaels clearance.  I already the vases and branches.

  • Tablecloth: $3
  • Cage candle holders: $6
  • Pumpkin bucket: $3
  • Gourds: $4
  • Leaf garlands: $6
  • Candles: $4
  • Glass candle holders: $4
  • Craft moss: $1

Total: $31

That’s it.  The entire house got a festive air for right around $50 and the majority of the decor is reusable for next year.

Halloween (and Fall) Decor Round-up

halloweenRoundup

Isn’t Pinterest fantastic?  And doesn’t it make you feel completely inferior?  Yeah…  Not everyone has endless time on their hands for crafting and that’s ok. I’ve compiled a list of  (mostly) simple projects you can use to decorate your home for Halloween and fall without losing your mind. Pick a couple depending your crafting ambition and you’ll still probably be more decked out than your neighbors. While a few of these are more involved, most can be accomplished with scissors, glue, and paint.

Decorate with Silhouettes

shelterness
Shelterness

 

made
Made

 

howAboutOrange
How About Orange

You can cut out a bunch while binge-watching Netflix.  Win, right?

 

Rock Your Entry

createCraftLove
Create Craft Love

Have some big branches from yard cleanup?  Hang on to them, add some fake ravens and voila!  If you don’t have branches this scale you could wedge smaller ones in planters to give them a little more height (and distract from the plants that are dying off with the frost)

endlesslyInspired
Endlessly Inspired

Don’t have any planters?  You can make some with cheap jack-o-lantern pails and stone effect spray paint (or go wild with any color you want, but I like the muted and vaguely creepy look for Halloween myself)

lilLuna
Lil Luna

So yeah, I linked to another round-up, but there are tons of options for Halloween/Fall door wreaths.

 

Mood Lighting

kimSixFix
The Kim Six Fix

Ok, so these are for decorative jars, but the effect would be pretty cool for on candle holders too, right?

craftyNest
Crafty Nest

Or use a small pumpkin for a candle holder and drill that puppy.

hpParty
Harry Potter Party Ideas

Have a little extra time (and are a Harry Potter fan)? You can DIY a floating candle ceiling!  More work than some glue and a coat of paint, but spectacular! You can also nix the night sky and keep the backdrop solid black.

Tablescape it

4frontDoors
Four Front Doors

Dollar store skeleton + dish + candle holder + paint = awesomely creepy dish.  You can use it for party treats or candles, either way it make a big statement on your table.

flamingoToes
Flamingo Toes

Ok, these are also a little more work but how cool are they??? One or two would still make a big impact if you don’t have time for a whole cluster and most of the supplies can be found easily on the cheap.

36Ave
The 36 Avenue

Spooky village anyone?  They found the Christmas village pieces at the dollar store and then just painted them black.

Think a Little More Fall

Halloween Decorations are all fine and good, but want if you want to feel fall festive for more than a couple weeks?  I try and use mostly things that are generally seasonal rather than holiday-specific (and then bring in a few holiday-specific items as needed).  For fall these barely need tutorials–a cluster of gourds and mini pumpkins, sprays of branches and (fake) fall leaves, groups of cozy candles.  But if you’re ambitious you can step it up a bit too.

decorEnvy
Decor Envy

Add a little bling with a garland of fake leaves and glitter paint.

Pinterest
Pinterest

Stack pumpkins or gourds in vases for more sophistication. So Simple there’s not even a tutorial needed.

heartsDesire
My Hearts Desire

Toss some corn (beans, split peas, etc) into the base of your candle holders for some added color and texture.