The Halloween crafts, ideas, recipes and costumes are coming out of my ears. Seriously, I’ve never seen this many but then again I’ve never looked around like I have either.

My Paper Crane shared cat and pumpkin images - she made them initially for suckers but others turned them into a sort of banner. We had the neighbors over yesterday and made a few different things.

Here are Alice’s cut outs ~

She cut out two more sheets worth, having 18 total, and strung them together top to bottom. She did stick with the pumpkin/cat/pumpkin/cat pattern and attached them to each other with pink and blue brads. She’s very much into patterns and alternated the colors pink/blue/pink/blue. She was very happy with herself for sticking with it! I’d have a picture but it has disappeared to the abyss that is her room (I swear I didn’t think kids rooms could be that messy!).

But one of the neighbor girls made the same kind of top to bottom stringing, and her Mom attached the younger girls into a wreath. The kids all lasted cutting them out and then they were done. Course they had already cut out and put together a skeleton.

The skeleton is awesome - you can find it here at the Sewing Stars blog. We made four or five of them and they quickly were traded back and forth, then attached to the banners that were made. I’m going to hang the banner up tomorrow and have the kids make a few more skeletons and hang them in the window! I’m proud of us for doing these crafts, we usually don’t decorate for Halloween other then a few stuffed pumpkins we’ve had since Alice was a few months old.

I printed all of the things at home and did have to adjust my printing - the margins and the size of the file. My printing option (or maybe it’s my printer?) lets you adjust the image by 10% at a time. It was very easy though.

Technorati Tags: My Paper Crane, cat and pumpkin images, Sewing Stars blog, halloween crafts

I’m so impressed with my kids! We have a birthday party to go to this afternoon and once they realized it was today - they ran upstairs and started making things for the little girl. Alice came back with a journal she made (cutting paper, stapling it together then writing First Diary and a math problem on the cover) wrapped up already. Jake made a pretend computer and wrote the alphabet on the bottom half on a folded piece of paper. Alice also traced a picture, and last I heard was working on a few more things because since the little girl is six, she needs six things.

I know Alice will want to give all of it to her and I wonder what the little girls reaction will be? So many kids are focused on electronic toys (though we are also giving her a movie) and I won’t want my kids feelings to be hurt by a ‘what the heck is this’ or some other not glad to receive this gift reaction. Maybe I’m just being paranoid.

For the kids friends I made gift bags to give out at the birthday party. I’m all about the party being about the birthday kid but I didn’t make invites for anyone so I figured a cute bag with snacks in it would be just as good.

Even though the party didn’t have a theme, this crab set from Stampin Up was perfect! The crab is holding a piece of cake in a shell, there are other accessories I could have included but I wanted to get it all done in a day so I kept it simple. You can kind of see the party hats on the side of the main image, which I realize works mostly on darker colored paper. Alice helped pick out which ribbon should go with which and also with the coloring. I didn’t want the crab to be all one color, I was going for a shaded look, but I ran out of time.

I put a few pieces of candy and a fruit snack in each bag - I made one for my kids plus the other four kids that came. Everyone was happy with them and my kids are still playing with theirs days later! I am so glad I did them and I’m wondering what else I can make them for. I do need to use different adhesive as the sides came apart much too easily for my liking.

I found the gift bag tutorial here - very easy to make and so cute!

All images/cardstock/ink copyright Stampin’ Up.

Technorati Tags: stampin up, gift bags

I was really lucky to only have one toy from the first recall list - it was the Elmo that was like a potato head, he had parts you could add to him. But the catch was the toy had to be made after May 2007 - ha, we’ve had that Elmo for at least three years! We did have to call in because of the toy oven recall - and would you believe they still haven’t sent the packaging/mailing info for that?

In case you missed this, here is a great list that Amy over at Angry Chicken put together - not made in china. I have a few things I am working on for the kids and for the baby, as well as projects the kids can make on their own. I’m hoping the sewing projects won’t be too advanced for Alice, but even with the little things she’s been working on she loves it and catches on quickly.

Technorati Tags: handmade toys

I feel like we watched only Disney movies today. Between the laundry, dishes and homeschool research I have to say The Lion King is still the best movie they put out! I’ve always loved that movie. We also watched The Little Mermaid - and I so love it that Alice wants to watch these movies. Jake isn’t that interested but that’s okay.

They had a good, restful day. Alice’s voice is gone now and Jake’s is coming back. I hate it when they are sick, they make me feel so bad. I’ve been having to give her lots of meds because she’s had a fever that just won’t go away. In the middle of the night last night it was 102.4 and she was shivering, I forgot that you got the chills when you have a fever. I took Jake to the dr the other day and (long story VERY short) after the dr saying nothing was wrong with him, he gave us meds anyway. I don’t usually rush to take them to the dr so the visit was very annoying, and I don’t look forward to another!

But Alice was feeling well enough to start a popsicle stick purse. We got halfway done today and ran out of sticks, so once we get more and finish I’ll show the pictures. It’s a project taken from the Craftster book - very fun, fast and easy. She’s having a great time building it and when I mentioned I thought it would need a little bag inside of it, she offered to jump up and get her sewing machine first thing. It’s a purple, green, red, blue, yellow, orange purse so who knows what fabric would look good in there! I’m going to look through my stash tomorrow before going out.

Did you do any crafty projects this weekend? We borrowed the Craftster book from the library so I’m going to see if there is anything else we have to do before returning it.

Technorati Tags: Crafster book, popsicle stick purse, Disney movies

Gymnastics camp ROCKED! It was so awesome. The kids had the best time and they came home completely wiped out every day. Twice this week Jake took up to an hour nap and still went to bed - sleeping 12 hours! Alice was the same way, minus the naps. They brought home a handful of painted pottery projects (Alice accidentally broke one but she and I are going to do a special Mom/Alice day and make another one) and his groups teacher is going to send me a few pictures she got.

They started gymnastics last October and went until May - up until then and including this week their skill levels has improved so much. I managed to get a few quick videos before we left today and once I get them to the computer I’ll share. Jake is a master at jumping from the low bar to the high and flipping. Alice can do a cartwheel off of the balance beam but we missed that with the video.

Now the hard part is figuring out what to keep doing for the school year. We were going to enroll both of them in gymnastics at the Y, each attending classes twice a week. The cost including our Y membership was the same as the cost of one class per week at the gym we have been attending. However we are now thinking maybe just gymnastics for Alice and soccer for Jake - but then I know Alice wants to play soccer too! I don’t want to be running my kids from place to place though so we need to check the schedules and talk more about what would work.

The best news of all is that the Coach said if they gave out Camper of the Week awards Jake would have received it! I’m so proud of him. He was the youngest or the second youngest person attending. The Coach said he didn’t whine, fight anyone, he was always excited, always happy and ready to go. He said he just did so well. That makes me feel really good - we have tried hard to make sure the kids deal well in classroom situations because we’ve seen other kids really misbehaving.

All in all a great week! We don’t have weekend plans yet but I think we are going to finally make a couple of towel aprons and the kids birthday party invites.

Everyone knows I am an office and school supply junkie! I was buying school supplies when my daughter was a baby. I just love all the new paper, pens, new products for the year and of course the great sales. This week Target has 64 count crayons (the ones w/ the built in sharpener) and a free twistable crayon (which are SO cool!) on sale for $1.50 - regularly $3.39′ish. I stocked up and bought two of each of my kids as well as a pack for each of my school age nephews and a niece.

Of course with the school year approaching my mind has been working overtime on figuring out what and how to teach Alice first grade. I’m kind of nervous but know that will go away. I’ve been checking out homeschooling books at the library and taking pages of notes, finding new websites and even made a quick stop at a local teacher supply store. I bought a lesson planning book (completely fulfilling the organizer/list maker in me!) and was looking for a calendar yesterday. My brain works differently then some in that my week starts on Sunday - if you look at a lot of calendars and planners many of them start on Monday! I went to two office stores until I finally found one at Barnes and Noble. I do use Google’s calendar, but after having to call the dentist and my dr for a reminder of my appt times, I realized I need a calendar I can carry with me.

In stopping at Office Depot I found 24 count crayons on sale - for 9 CENTS! Yes, NINE cents! Run, don’t walk, to Office Depot right now. You can only buy 5 at a time so I did and so did my friend with me. Only one of her daughters is old enough to play with crayons so I took three of her five packs. Target has the same crayons selling for 20 cents, regular price, not on sale. I thought last year they cost a quarter, but I may be wrong. I already bought some at Target but couldn’t let the nine cent ones pass me up!

I also bought new kid scissors and glue sticks - I’m a huge price checker and Target made me laugh out loud. They have those centers set up with various supplies in them - crayons, pens, pencils, erasers, etc. - and the glue sticks were being sold a 2 pack for twenty cents. Then on the opposite side of the same center a six pack was being sold for $2.19! Hello - a dollar for six or more then twice that. I wonder what I will pick.

It’s time to get the kids school supplies out and see what else we need to replenish. I don’t think we need a lot but I admit it’s hard to stay away from when there is a great sale!