Pumpkin Party!

My BFF and I LOVE to put together parties. Last night we celebrated Halloween with our festive Pumpkin Party! We set the table with all sorts of spooky decorations and delicious treats, then invited some of our favorite friends over to celebrate with us!


Wyatt was very interested in what we were serving up. Every time he passed the table, he took a handful of pumpkin pretzels. When I caught up with him, he had devoured them, piggy style, and was covered in orange candy smears. Sigh!

Keisha hollowed out some mini pumpkins and placed tea lights inside for some precious festive decor.



We made Yolanda Banks' Mac and Cheese recipe using non-fat evaporated milk, served slider sandwiches, made up a salad with homemade honey mustard dressing.
For dessert we served up white chocolate covered Oreo skulls, pumpkin cupcakes with buttercream frosting, and apple cider floats.



In the backyard we had tables set up to paint and inside we had a table set up for carving and other crafts. Glitter was the #1 favorite, so there were some fabulous pumpkins by the end of the night.

Katie P. working on her flower covered pumpkin. She even brought her own hot glue gun! Crafty girl...

Not dressed for carving or painting, but watching from a safe distance!

We had some very creative kiddos (and mamas) last night who made some BOO-tiful pumpkins!



We handed out party favors - a mix of cocoa puffs, Reese's pieces, pretzels, cheese nips, cheerios, Whoppers, and candy corn - all tied up with a fall bow! Wyatt was very curious about these favors - or maybe just the cocoa puffs?

Which one is mine?

I had a good time and was glad to watch everyone in action. Very fun!

Sensory Bins

My friend and fellow teacher, Amanda, put me on to the idea of sensory bins. Her baby is a few months younger than Dub and when I saw how much fun he was having playing in his bin, I knew it was something we had to try.

Bins can be themed: numbers, all things that start with A, fall, Halloween, nature...whatever you can imagine. The point is that you get the senses involved in the process.

We made our first bin a Halloween bin, and W has been having a blast. We chose dry black beans and a bag of white northern beans to mix up in our plastic box. Then I buried Halloween themed items. We only play with the bin outside because of a few throwing incidents that caused me to have an OCD setback, but W is pretty good about rounding up beans that have escaped and putting them back in the box.

At first, he was very tentative about getting involved. He only stuck his fat index finger into the beans and then shook his head no. Exhibit A:


But it wasn't long before the colorful things poking up out of the beans lured him in. The first day, he used the toys to dig for other toys. Today, however, he really got into it and even wanted to put his bare feet into the beans.

BAT...he said it! Look at him working on the b sound! Amazing!

It's a really fun thing to put together and to play with. We've had such a good time uncovering the buried items. Each time he makes such a sound of exclamation that I know it's doing something good for his giant baby brain. :)


I don't know what this is, really, but it makes an excellent shovel.

What is this?

I want to put my feet in here...feels weird.

You can read more about sensory bins here!
I'm thinking that our November bin is going to involve trimmed up hay and some acorns, leaves, pumpkins, tiny scarecrows - all things that you can pick up at any craft store for pretty cheaply! We've even been picking up items on our afternoon walks to add to the bin. Excited.

Luminaries

I've always adored how sweet luminaries look lining a walk way. I've also always been afraid of them starting a fire...but that's secondary.
For Katie's wedding, I have been crafting up a storm, and I came up with this flame resistant luminary idea.
I bought a 12 count of canning jars that were smooth on one side.
I printed and cut out my stencil guide, then I traced it on the glass with marker.
Using a small paintbrush, I painted in the letters using their primary wedding color - navy.


I added ribbon, added sand, added a battery operated candle, and called it a day!
Easy and super cute shabby chic!

Fair Day 2011

Gabby, Aunt Sue, and I took Wyatt to the State Fair last week. It was an overcast day, which made the temps so nice. Wyatt looked around at everything from the safe perch of his stroller. He tried a few completely new things: ice cream, frito pie, corny dogs, lemonade, and cotton candy (A+ parenting right here, folks).

Eating ice cream while wearing my new necklace. Dang! This stuff if COLD!

Cotton Candy: This went over like gangbusters...

His favorite thing was the petting zoo. He ran from cage to cage yelling and pointing. They handed out little cups of food for the animals, but the mean goats just took & ate everything - including the cups. That's probably why their cheese tastes so bad.


His second favorite thing was the fountains. He leaned over as far as he could to splash his hand in the water.

What? I'm not supposed to do this?

Group effort to wrangle and get shoes on the Bug!

Y'all take me over there. I'm getting tired.

This is the second annual Fair trip for W, so I dug up a few photos from last year. Last year was such a different experience from this year - I'm always amazed at how much he is growing and changing. He's not a baby anymore (tear!).

Being friendly - saying HOWDY!

Same fountains...different baby!

Watching a cooking demo with Gabby!

Too tired to continue!

Pumpkin Decorating with Buttons

Pinterest has sucked away large amounts of my time lately, but I did see a cute craft that I had to try out involving pumpkins and buttons.

Bestie Keisha and I are throwing a pumpkin party right before Halloween, so we wanted to do a couple of pumpkins as testers. This was my example!

First things first, I bought my smallish pumpkin at Tom Thumb for $1. Sold! Then I pilfered through my button jar at home and fished out all of the black ones. I didn't have enough, but luckily JoAnn Fabric sells 130 black buttons of varying sizes for $2.39.


I printed and traced my stencil.


I used craft glue to affix the buttons. Since the pumpkin is round, you can only do one letter at a time and then let it dry so that the buttons don't slide around.


I tied a ribbon up top and set it in the cabinet. Done! I love Halloween!!!!

Spook-tacular!!!

A few things were accomplished today...first and foremost, my sister and I ran our first 5k together. Katie has run a half, so this was no biggie...except that we were able to run it together. I'm not going to lie...the path was crazy hilly and I pretty much almost cried/kicked over the mile marker sign when we came upon the 2mi designation (WHAT? ONLY 2 MILES!!!! SERIOUSLY?). But we kept on and we finished with a 32 minute stop time. Pretty proud.

We celebrated by enjoying some gelato in the cool night air and then buying some chardonnay at Whole Foods. Cheers, sister!

But today was also a day of tying up lose ends and finishing some fall projects.

My friend sent this idea for a Fall Bucket List, so I adapted it a little, drew a sketchy tree, and wrote down my bucket list. Each leaf includes something I would like to accomplish:
Trip to the Farmer's Market
Run a 5k (check)
Run a 10k (I'm ready for you, Porter)
Sew a fall pillow
Visit the Ft. Worth Zoo with Aunt Sue
Bake pumpkin/gingersnap cakeballs (recipe on Pinterest)
Go to an Oktoberfest (check)
Organize my recipe book (sigh!)
Take Dub to a football game

There are 25 total items to complete, but you know this girl loves a challenge. Once I've completed a task, the leaf goes on the tree. Kind of backwards, I know...but that is what I came up with.

In other news, the house is finally ready for Halloween. I've had so much fun getting our place in order. A trip to Canton with my bestie helped get the front lawn in order.
Wyatt doesn't like the glitter spiders very much, but he loves handling the mini pumpkins! I ordered his Halloween costume, so get ready for some cuteness.
Until then...here's a look at the place all done up! Happy Halloween, ghouls!

Painted glass jar with candle inside (Pinterest, again). W loves watching the pumpkin face!

Mantle Banner from Etsy's Inspirational Banners Shop - love her stuff!

My favorite bench! I did most of these pillows myself, but did have to buy a few to supplement.

And, finally, a view from the front yard:

Trick or Treat Bucket

I've been on the hunt for the perfect candy bowl for handing out candy to Trick-or-Treaters. Our sweet neighbors told us that the neighborhood gets a ton of goblins and I love candy so much that I want to be prepared. Unfortunately with little man, I can't have anything around that is breakable (read cute). Everything functional for my household was plasticy and yucky. With Mod Podge in hand, I decided to make my own treat bucket.

I bought the black bucket at Target for $6. It came in black or orange and it came in this oval shape or in a true circle.

hello, doggy helper in the corner

I found a font that I liked and printed/cut out the letters. I used Mod Podge to affix the letters to the bucket. Easy. After two coats of Mod Podge, I moved on to painting.




Using a circle sponge brush, I added my polka dots. I did two coats of paint. I then added the candy corn stickers (purchased at Michael's). I applied three additional coats of MP and let those dry. I finished up by tying pumpkin ribbon around the handles and added my candy.

Inside of the bucket - lined with candy corn stickers



Now...who knows if that candy will last until 10/31...but at least it has a cute container to call home!