Happy Halloween!!!!

Phew!  

I feel like I've been missing for a few years!

I've been sitting at my sewing machine pretty much all week working on costumes for my girls.  I have not been able to focus on much else.  I'm sorry if I've seemed absent lately.  But, they turned out so cute!

Here is L:

She's a cupcake.

She liked her costume so much, she wouldn't stop dancing.  It was hard to get a good picture.  =) 

Finally, Daddy picked her up and tickled her legs. 

Sweet.

P.S.  Her costume was inspired by this pin:

Here is the link to Lemon Tree Creations and her tutorial.  I didn't follow her tutorial, but I was absolutely inspired.

Next is O:

She is a pirate princess.

Her wand was a bit distracting. 

She loved it.

But I finally got her to stand still.  

We went to a church party on Saturday and we had a great time.  You know, we brought home A LOT of candy.  We might not need to go trick-or-treating tonight!

Oh!  I almost forgot.

I forgot to get a picture of my costume, but my husband was kind enough to sneak one in at the party.  It's fuzzy, but you get the idea.

I think striped tights and tutus should be part of every day wardrobe.  Wouldn't that be fun?!

Happy Halloween, All!  May you receive a great bounty of candy!

Halloween Haunts

 In case you missed it, here is the project I posted over at Doodles and Doilies.  

Remember my Felt Dot Garland?  I love it.  Really, I do.  But it is Halloween and it needed some spookifying.  

Here's what I did:

I added some haunts to the garland.

Here's how I made them:

The first thing I did was find a circle cookie cutter and trace out 3 circles.  Then I sketched out the faces that I wanted.

I'm going to focus just on the ghost for the sake of space.  Hopefully, that will give you the basics enough to run with it, but if you need help or advice, please feel free to contact me!

Once you have your sketch/idea in mind, move on to some felt. 

Trace out and cut 2 circles.

Using the sketch, cut out the features for the face.

This was the mouth for my ghost. 

Please ignore my chipping nail polish.  It was late at night and I really wanted to finish this.  I figured it was better to have unfinished nails than an unfinished ghost.  I hope you'll understand.  =)

Now, using black embroidery thread and a running stitch, I sewed that mouth into place on one of the circles. 

On the second circle, I drew the letters.  BOO! 

Then, with the black thread, I embroidered those letters.

Now, it is time to create the ghost.  

I grabbed some purple ribbon to hang it with.  Place it on one of the circles in the position you like and pin it (take a lesson from me, pin on the right side so you don't lose your pin).   

I also grabbed a scrap of tulle, folded it up into a kind of a messy gather and pinned that in as well.

To sew the two pieces together, I used white thread and a running stitch again, being careful to keep my knots on the inside.  I was also very careful to make sure that my thread caught the ribbon and tulle to hold it in place.

Before you close it up, stuff it just a little with some fiberfill... 

which, by the way, was pretty much impossible for me to get a good picture of with my little camera.  You get the idea, though, right?

Finish sewing it up and, *bing*, you're done. 

He's kind of cute!   

For a ghost.

The possibilities are endless.  You can use any design you want!

These could even work at Thanksgiving (how cute would a turkey be?) or Christmas (reindeer?)  

What would you make?

I'm linking these haunts up here!

Easy Peasy Ghost Decorations!

This is a project that I believe is inspired by my mother.  =)  I'm pretty sure I remember either making these with her or watching her make them and I know we had them hanging around the house at Halloween.

I've been wanting to make my own for a while now.  Thank you, Blog, for the motivation!

Here is what you will need:

• A lot of white fabric.  I used a twin size sheet.  The amount you use depends on how many ghosts you want.  I ended up with more about 20 from 1 sheet.
• Fiberfill.
• Yarn
• A sharpie
• Fishing wire

Here is my sheet laid out on the couch:

I took that sheet and, with reckless abandon, I cut it up.  

Ok, not really reckless abandon, but I didn't worry too much about straight lines and such.  I folded it in half, cut roughly along the line, folded that piece in half and cut along that line, and so on until I had a bunch of rectangles.

It is about 10 inches x 14 inches.  

Now, take your fiberfill. 

Side note:  If you are going to take a picture of it, don't have your 3-year-old hold it with the 1-year-old helping.  It won't turn out.  

Take a small amount of the filling and place it in the center of your rectangle. 

Does anyone else find it really difficult to get a picture of fiberfill?  It's so fuzzy!

Now, gather up your fabric like so around the filling and twist it into a little ghost head.

Tie a small piece of yarn (or other stringlike substance) around the neck to hold the stuffing in. 

Now use your Sharpie to draw eyes and a mouth on.  I didn't get a picture of this.  Probably because I had so much "help."

String your fishing line through a needle and run that through the top of the ghost's head. 

See the help?

The length of the line depends on how much dangling you want your ghosts to do.  I vary mine so that they don't look too uniform.  

Draw the line through and tie the ends together so you have a loop to hang from. 

Now go and hang your ghosts where ever you need a little haunting!

Gasp!  Do you see that ghost in the mirror!!!!

No worries...

It's just me!

I'll be linking this up with these super fun parties!

I'm not here today!

I'm super excited to be participating in the Spooktacular over at Doodles and Doilies today!

Head on over and say hi!

What Day is It?

Do you ever just get so caught up in something that everything else kind of disappears?

Yeah, me too.  I didn't even mean to this time!  The second round for American Crafter is "House of Order" and it has got me spinning with ideas on all the order my house could be in.  I am almost done with my project now, and I'm actually feeling very satisfied by it, but it is kind of a miracle that I've gotten anything else done!

I didn't realize how distracted I have been by this project until last night when I was putting O to bed.  In an effort to stall her bedtime, she was making up things to tell me.  Then, as I was leaving the room, she said, "Mama?  Do you mind...um, can we have a date tomorrow?"

So, today, we planned a date.

While putting my things in order (not for the project, just in general...the organizing thing is kind of addicting!), I came across this little kit I bought on clearance (50 cents!) at the end of the Halloween season last year.  

So, our first order of business was to decorate. 

Sorry about the blurriness of the pictures.  She was so excited, I couldn't get her to hold still!

Here is our mantle: 

Then, we put up a "tent," 

Popped popcorn, 

And watched a movie.

It was a good time.  

I apologize if I have neglected any of you with my distraction.  If it helps, feel free to put up a tent, pop popcorn, and watch a movie while imagining I'm there with you.  I don't mind.

Halloween Wreath: Round 1 of American Crafter

Hello!

Did you guys get a chance to get over to Naptime Crafters and vote?  Voting closes Sunday at 8:00 p.m. MDT.  Don't miss it!

Here is the project that I submitted for the Halloween theme.  I left the text in there, because that's part of the experience.

Halloween:  The word usually brings to mind creepy images of ghosts, witches, mummies, skeletons, jack-o-lanterns, werewolves, zombies, vampires.  It's all good and fun, but, when it comes down to it, isn't the best part of Halloween the night of free candy?  So, here I have designed a soft, fluffy Halloween wreath with an enticing offering of candy.

Those fruity candies are pretty easy to get to, but the good stuff is up a little higher.  It needs to be reached for...earned.  So, you stretch out your hand, barely able to reach; you grab a firmer hold on that beautiful chocolate (why is that spooky music playing in the background?) and pull down firmly (wee, wee, wee, wee--read that like Psycho music)!  

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!  

It's the dreaded Monster Wreath!!!!

Now, here is the backstage pass to see how it was done.  Well...kind of see how it was done.  This was kind of a figure-it-out-as-you-go kind of project and I got so involved in it, that I forgot to take pictures once I figured something out.

I'll tell you what I can, though.

I started with a yarn wreath, using the same technique I did before, but the form was a styrofoam form I found in my craft room (good fortune!).  

Next, I found this yarn:  Fun Fur. 

It's really hard to crochet with (possible, but hard) but it works beautifully on a wreath...especially a monster wreath.  I have 2 skeins there because I wasn't sure how many it would take to cover the wreath.  It turned out that 1 covered it exactly.  I didn't glue this on the wreath, because I wanted the hair to stick out.  Tying it on worked very well.

This is the only after picture I got of it once all the yarn was wrapped. 

You can see my sketches on paper for the teeth and I was experimenting with paper to figure out how to get the eyes just right.  I'll tell you what I came up with in just a second.

To make the "Free Candy" pouch, I took a piece of felt and folded it in half lengthwise. 

Then I sewed up the two ends, creating a pocket. 

On the corners of the bottom of the pouch, I sewed a diagonal line, like this: 

That way when I turned it right side out, it stayed open a bit.

For the lettering, I free-handed the embroidery, starting with the "N" in "candy" so I could make sure it was all centered. 

Now, I cut the teeth out of craft foam. 

I did this free hand as well because I wanted them to be crooked and jagged.  

If you are doing something like this, make sure the teeth are long enough that they can be seen when they are pulled down, but short enough to not be seen when they are behind the wreath.

Also, I ended up not using these teeth because they didn't pull right.  I used 3 sets of teeth, with 2 or 3 teeth per set, tying 1 set to each eye.

To make the eyes, I ended up using 2 circles of felt, one colored to match the yarn and one white (for the eyeball).   

I stitched all the way around the top, for show, but only attached the two at the top.

That way it opens. 

They googly eye is hot glued in and the whole eye is hot glued in place.

The whole thing is rigged with fishing line.

Note:  Don't let your 3-year-old play with the fishing line when you're not watching.   

Unless you're good at untangling hard-to-see knots.

The teeth hang behind the wreath and are attached to the eyelids so that when you pull the teeth down and out of hiding, the eyes pop open.

The teeth are then attached with the fishing line to the ribbon and the candy bars (which, by the way, are just the wrappers.  I ate the chocolate.) so that when you grab the ribbon/chocolate decoy the teeth come out and the eyes pop open.  (You can see the line in these pictures.)  

The ribbon is wired.  I folded its ends and pinned it to the back, leaving enough of the fold unpinned so that it would come unfolded with it got pulled without tearing or ruining the wreath.  (Does that make sense?)  Also, wired ribbon holds the shape better.

BOO!

heehee.

There, now you have the basics.  Enough, I hope, to attempt your own and let your own creativity take over! Let me know how it goes!

Oh, and thanks for voting!

Linking up to my parties!