Spooky Shirts

Version I found on Zulily: 

 

My version:

I was going to do a jack-o-lantern face on Kiki's, but she picked out the scariest face that the Silhouette store had to offer. I didn't want her to make the other 3-year-olds in her class pee themselves any more than they already do. So we went with her fav, a kitty.

Loving my new embroidery machine!

I'll be linking up here.

Halloween! (a little late)

I was without my computer for over a week. Thank goodness for Wii. It was a little slow, but it kept me in touch with the blog world. Now that my laptop is back, it's brings a new meaning to Thanksgiving (well, that and a few other very important blessings, is suppose...)



Halloween was super eventful for us this year and loved every second. I've been running on higt energy, so I did almost every crafty thing I could get my hands on. There's a lot to cover, so I'll begin.



My father in law does a huge monster set-up every year on his lawn. It's a pretty cool sight. Yes. That is a life-size Sully from Monsters Inc. Yes. My in-laws officially have anything and everything you could ever need for the holidays in their home:




On Saturday night, we had some Mummy dogs before trick-or-treating:

And some spooky potatoes:

Such cute costumes! We had a Batman (actually we had 2, but we didn't get Oliver in the pic), a Sprite can (Ari's own idea, so creative!), a pirate boy, Indiana Jones (sans hat at the moment) and a pirate girl. I think it's funny that Kiki and Noah picked the same costume.

They are quite a pair!: The week before Halloween, we had many events as well. Here's Finn's class party:

I'm homeroom mom for the class and I am loving it! It was so much fun to make stuff for the kids and set up the tables. I think they all liked it:

On Wednesday, we had a fabulous Halloween party at my friend Melissa's house. Kiki decided to switch it up a little and be a fairy for the occasion:

Melissa and her amazing spread:

AND she made a goodie basket for each family! Look at all the goodies!

We also went trick-or-treating at the zoo. It's always so much fun, but SO crowded. Sharyn joined us, of course:

Me and my little pirate:

It was the best Halloween yet!

Who's Eating Who?

I'll admit. I'm not the greatest innovator. Where I really excel is execution. Give me the idea and I'll create it as efficiently as possible. I found the idea for all these treats on other blogs and just had to make them myself!
Monster cupcakes: Franken-pops (Finn absolutely refuses to eat these, however Kiki loved them):

And Halloween candy skewers:

Yum!

One Wreath, Two Ways

My friend Kristal made this cutie a few weeks ago with beans, and I've seen a bunch of tutorials on similar topics, so today I made my own out of acorns. I got a foam wreath frame and ribbon from the dollar store and I put my kids to work gathering acorns on Sunday morning. Finn had the great idea to collect the fat little gold balls that were falling from the trees as well, so I put them around the edge. I should go back for more of them though. I think a wreath made entirely of the balls would be really pretty.
I hot-glued on my "found" objects, spray-painted it all white, added some ribbon and viola! a spooky black and white wreath for Halloween. I hung it over my home-made mod-podged "BOO"sign:

Or, with a change of ribbon, a festive fall wreath (paired with my fabric wreath from a few posts ago):

I like both looks, but I suppose I'll keep the spookier version up for Halloween!

I'll be linking up on Wednesday with Tea Rose Home's Wednesday link party!

Happy Halloween!

We had a lot of activities this week and Finn refused to wear a costume to ALL of them! He was adamant about not wearing one (he just wants to "be Finnigan"), so I didn't force the issue, but on Halloween night, we put him in costume without him realizing it. He was such a cute little motorcycle dude!:

Kinley was an adorable butterfly. She loved trick-or-treating. In fact, I think Finn wore out sooner than she did:

Here's a pic of all the kids dressed up Halloween night for trick-or-treating:

Scott, Sharyn and I dressed up for trick-or-treating at the zoo:

What's New

I haven't posted much this week due to a lack of things to talk about! It's been pretty quiet around here actually. But here's what's new:
--Scott and I are thrilled Obama won! I think he's a great leader and I'm so excited for the next 4 years!
--We had a pretty good Halloween. We've been infested with wasps so we didn't hand out Halloween candy (I didn't want to open and close the door and have them flying in and out). We didn't go trick-or-treating either. I think we will next year. We DID go to the Storybook Forest here in town. It was awesome! Finn got to trick-or-treat from storybook characters and then play some games for prizes. They also had a hayride and campfires that you could roast hot dogs and marshmellows at. It is definitly going to be a new fall tradition! (I, of course, forgot to bring my camera!)
--Kinley has been a doll lately. She's been smiling a lot and cooing so much! She just loves to "talk" to us! She's also been gracious enough to let me dress her in numerous bows and outfits!
--Kinley was 11 lbs. 8 oz. at her 2 month check up yesterday. The doctor was very impressed with her head control and said she might start rolling over soon.
--The poor girl had to have 3 shots yesterday! She was very upset about it and I think her poor leg hurt for the rest of the night.
--Finn has been playing out back with his doggie a lot lately. Usually after about a half hour he takes off his pants and shoes (and occasionally his diaper!). I'm not really sure why he does this, but at least he likes to keep things interesting!
--I think I'm going to start preliminary potty training this week. The first stage is to have your toddler "teach" a doll to use the potty. And I have a DVD we're going to watch about it.
--Next week we are going to see Celine Dion! I am so excited! Also, we are going to visit family next weekend! A lot of them I haven't seen in over a year. It will be fun!

Lots of Fun coming!

Finn is very adamant about not wanting to wear a costume for Halloween! We have a ton of them already, in particular, I was wanting him to wear a cute full-body lion suit. But, he is having none of it! So, when we went to the Haunt the Zoo trick-or-treat trail on Monday, he was a...(drumroll please!)...lumberjack? Farmer? Canadian? I put him in overalls, flannel shirt and one of those goofy hats for warmth. I think he was the only kid there with no costume. I don't blame him though. I don't really like to dress up either. I only go as far as to put on a "Trick-or-Treat" shirt and then I call it a day.

Kinley is super easy! You just throw anything you want on her. I bought her a super warm ladybug costume. She was very content to just sit all bundled up for the whole trail!

Anyway, I am so excited that the election is less than a week away! I've recently been thinking about education more since I realized both my kids will start school during this adminstration! I think Obama will be so great for this! I know McCain has a ton of kids and I'm sure he cares about education too, but Obama's girls are school age NOW. It's obviously going to be weighing on his mind more. I just think that if you have children, McCain is too big of a gamble right now. I want change for my children and not the down-ward spiral that has been going on for the last 8 years. Just wanted to put that out there!

We are still planning on doing more Halloween activities. We have a party tomorrow and hopefully we will be doing another trick-or-treat trail this week too! Finn really loved doing the one at the zoo. We're not going to go trick-or-treating though. I think he's old enough, but his lack of a costume would be a problem (although I did buy him a "Trick-or-Treat" shirt to match mine). Also, I seriously think he would want to enter every house we went to and make friends! He is such a friendly little guy!

I forgot to mention that Tonya and I threw a baby shower for our friend Melissa last weekend. I think it went really well and she got a TON of great stuff for her little boy, to be named Phoenix. YAY Melissa!

Also, I have been meaning to post a beer bread recipe on here. Tonya (who just started her own blog on Blogspot) gave this to me and it is so simple and yummy! All you do is mix 3 c. self-rising flour, 1 c. (or less) sugar or Splenda (I've tried both and it tastes the same) and a can of beer (or any type of soda you want. Bake for about an hour at 350 degrees. It's really yummy to rub some butter on the top halfway through. I've been making a loaf every few days for the last month or so b/c it is so good!

Fun Times

My mom is so lucky to have 2 great sisters. They are all really close in age, and even though they live in 3 different cities, they make a big effort to stay really close. Once a year, they have a "sisters weekend" trip where they travel somewhere together and just hang out. I think it's pretty cool. They already had their sisters weekend this year, but they decided to all hang out together in the city this weekend, which meant they came to visit us and the new baby! I thought I would put up a few pictures of my aunties to make them "famous!" Finn really enjoyed seeing them (they DID bring some pretty cool gifts!) and is still talking about "Aunt Doby" and drinking from Aunt Glenda's water bottle.

Also this weekend, we made some Halloween cookies! They actually turned out a lot better than I expected. I usually have high expectations for my crafty projects until I realize I forgot an ingredient or something else goes wrong. But on this one, I was pleasantly surprised!

Here's Finn enjoying one:

A lot of hands, and 2 feet

Finn has started doing arts and crafts with me! It's really cool because with the holidays coming up there are all sorts of fun things to draw and make. And it's an awesome way to teach him all his colors! We did pumpkin pictures today (that's Finn's above--he filled in the "face") and then I started outlining his hands and he loved it so much we had to do it about 20 times! It's so cool that he understands Halloween so much more this year. I hope he'll be excited about the costume part too!