Getting Ready for Halloween!!

Here are some of the items I'm making for Halloween!  And this year, I'm giving Isabel a Halloween Party!!  There's nothing quite like a bunch of 7 and 8-year-olds running and screaming through your house to calm your nerves - especially on All Hallows Eve!!!

Okay, so picture a bunch of rocks, which we gathered at Aunt Pat's house on the river over the Labor Day Weekend.  The trick is to get rocks that can "stand up".  Then you paint them a solid color and, after that dries, you paint faces on them!  How cool is that?!  I LOVE this idea! Unfortunately, I can't remember where I got the idea from!  So if any of you have seen it in a recent Halloween magazine and can name the artist, please do so because I want to make sure they get full credit for such a great and easy idea for the holidays!  The original article only had orange painted rocks for pumpkins, but I wanted some white ghosts and Isabel also wanted one "evil black pumpkin"!  So all I have to do now is paint the faces on.  Will give you an update soon!

This is my latest idea!  This house-shaped box held Isabel's Fairy birthday cake.  I thought I'd save it and make a Christmas Gingerbread house, but I already have several of those and really no more room to speak of for any more Christmas items (though that usually doesn't stop me from getting more)!  Anyway, I realized I needed something pretty spectacular for Halloween, especially since I'm having a kid's party, so I decided to do a Haunted Spook House!!  As you can see, I haven't gotten very far!  First I painted it with white gesso to cover the printing on it.  Then the roof came next, in purple.  I may put some glitter on it later, but not sure yet.  The pieces you see in the foreground are doll's house window frames and a cupola.  They will probably be painted black, and I think the body will be orange!  To the left of the picture is a bag of spindly sticks; I'm hoping on making a rickety fence to encircle the whole thing, which I plan to display in my kitchen garden window!  Whew!! Great plans! Now if I can just get them finished!!  Till later than.....with Love and Blessings! Jan

Isabel's Second 8th Birthday Party!!

A motley looking crew if there ever was one!!

The presents starts piling up!

We're all in our places with bright shiny faces!!

Making a wish and blowing out the candle!!

It's a pillow! It's a pet!  It's a Pillow Pet!!

A purple unicorn no less!!

A paint your own messenger bag, Tinkerbell jewelry kit and markers, a Princess Pen

and a Pink Princess Diary! 

Some of the decorations I put up! I LOVE these tassels! They're from one of my favorite stores - T.J. Maxx - from about a year ago. And the Pinata is from Hobby Lobby - another favorite store of mine! But Isabel and I agreed we wouldn't break it open because it's too pretty! So one of these days, when she's thoroughly sick of it, we might put candy in it and whack it open.  But not for now!

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Well, that's it for now!  Isabel is still getting presents in the mail from family all over the world, including her Mommy in Afghanistan!  It's a wonder she isn't a spoiled rotten miserable little monkey.  But she isn't, and that's what other people say, as well as me!  And I agree with them wholeheartedly!  Till later than! Jan

Better Late Than Never!! (AKA: Isabel's 8th Birthday Parties!)

I've taken way too long to get back to this blog and so much has happened!!  So without further ado, here are photos from Isabel's 8th birthday parties!  Yes, there were two of them! One before my daughter Laura left for Afghanistan for a year and one on her birthday!  Here they are - from the 1st Birthday!

This is a Fairy Cake, with a water fall and 5 different fairies which are actually stamp pads!! 

Another view - from the back!  

Hey! This is my cake!!