'Twas the day before Halloween

'Twas the day before Halloween, and all through our house,
the pumpkins were gutted,
and scooped
with great care,
the treat bowls were heaped up,
our big tree says beware!,
costumes were laundered and hung waiting to scare (just a peek now! You will see him tomorrow)...

in the hopes the Great Pumpkin soon would be here.

On the third day of Halloween

Oh, it's almost here!

On the third day of Halloween, the Great Pumpkin gave to me:
One freshly made Halloween shirt for me (the most exciting part of the shirt is that while digging for a shirt to dye I realized that I could have been dying all those stained t-shirts of mine instead of throwing them away. DUH! I will be more frugal in the future for sure now...);
one spooky specimen display, complete with bones, feathers, bugs (real carcasses of course!), and other what nots (my husband made the stand out of some hardware cloth, clever guy that he is);
one "cabinet of horrors", one glass Halloween ornament tree, one graduated cylinder, one feathery cat and more;
here, let me open the door for you (mwahahaha), don't forget to click to enlarge (never mind the crap on the floor, lol);
one Martha Stewart eyeball wreath, made many moons ago, but with fresh, new, gooey eyeballs this year;

gas at $2.28 a gallon (whooooooooooofreakinghoooooooo!);

and one family movie night watching It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown. Jack is crazy over Snoopy. I swear he can perfectly imitate that really horrible Snoopy laugh. I spent more time watching him enjoying it than I did watching the show.

Ahhh, the good life.

Are you all ready yet? We haven't even started the pumpkins. Oh my!

On the fourth day of Halloween

On the fourth day of Halloween, the Great Pumpkin gave to me:
One glow in the dark skeleton, made by Jack (!) at a Lowe's Build and Grow Workshop (which I, ahem, confiscated so it wouldn't be destroyed. I want to keep it forever.);
one new to me vintage duvet cover in harvest colors which I dried on the line yesterday, despite it being 40 degrees and gray outside (it's officially an obsession, me and the old duvet covers, that is);
one bat chandelier which just makes the blue door perfect for Halloween, never mind the pesky cord which I never know what to do with (my boa needs adjusting apparently, and seeing the photo gives me an idea of what to do with the cord);
one loaf of oh my goodness fantastic no knead bread, made with this super cute photo tutorial . If her 4 year old can do it, so can mine! And he did.;

and our very first frost. Brrrrrrrrrrrrr. Wonderful.

On the fifth day of Halloween

On the fifth day of Halloween, the Great Pumpkin gave to me:
One chalkboard pumpkin (a faux pumpkin + can of chalkboard paint) and one of my favorite fall treasures, hedge apples;
one junky old ladder filled with vintage halloween costumes, masks and trick or treat bags;
and yummy! pumpkin brownies (one box of brownie + one can of pumpkin + 2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice - half the oil and - half the eggs).

And I am NOT a food photographer, LOL.

Speaking of photos, blogger seems to be acting weird and the photos seem tiny. I LOVE it when blogger starts to get creative. Not. Click to enlarge if you need to.

We are in the final Halloween stretch. I can't believe it's almost here already!

Repeat after me

It's only a mouse Sarah. It's only a mouse.

Well, it's only mice. Yes, plural.

We finally managed to catch two, after not catching any of them since we first spotted one last week. (And yes, we had to catch them in a rather nasty way. They were just having fun with the peanut butter on the nicer traps.)

But that was not before we were up all night hunting them down. I can hear them chewing in the walls and frankly, that freaks me the hell out.

They've even chewed a hole in the wall behind my damn stove! And even worse, they were living on a cereal bar they found in my purse. A purse that was hanging from a nail 5 feet off the ground in the closet.

Oh yes they were.

Argh. Disgusting.

So 10 hours today have been spent totally cleaning out all the closets and the hideous, huge mess that was our garage.

We found what we are pretty sure is the entry hole and a nest.

Hopefully there will only be a few more sleepless nights before we have caught them all.

Oh please let the nightmare end soon! This is way too spooky, even for me.

And suddenly all those Martha Stewart mice we have around the house don't seem so charming anymore...

On the sixth day of Halloween

On the sixth day of Halloween, the Great Pumpkin gave to me:

One trip to the pumpkin patch complete with...
a haybale spider;
a Halloween bounce house;
photo ops;
corn angels (instead of snow angels, of course);
cow milking;
and plenty of digging in a "kettle of corn".

On the seventh day of Halloween

On the seventh day of Halloween, the Great Pumpkin gave to me:
One wickedly cool mercury glass pumpkin (forgotten about until this year, bought on clearance after Halloween last year);
two super fun tie dyed Jack-o-Lantern tee shirts (idea from Family Fun magazine, but I don't see it on their website);
one cloche full of glow in the dark bones;
and another cloche full of glow in the dark bones for the kitchen;

one trip to the movies to see Igor with Jack (it wasn't my favorite movie, but taking Jack to the movies is always a treat);

and one Swingtown (!!!!) marathon on Bravo.

Thank you Great Pumpkin, we love you so.

On the eighth day of Halloween

On the eighth day of Halloween, the Great Pumpkin gave to me:
One very vintage Halloween photograph, a most awesome gift from Jen at Scissors Paper Glue (sorry the scan quality is so poor, vista doesn't recognize my printer anymore and scanning is a real disaster);
one super cute black kitty treat bucket (why don't they make cats anymore?);
and two super fun games of rainy day bowling.
Jack was really getting into it.

LOL

Only one more week until Halloween!!!! I need to go make something. Stat.

P.S. Comments appear back to normal now? I am sure this will be a month long pain in the rear end. LOL Sorry if you can't read the comments while they are switching things around. I had nothing to do with the font size when they went to the "new and improved" (NOT) comment form. Aye.

Old tricks

I see that blogger is up to their old tricks again. Everything has to be new and improved doesn't it?

Can anyone still actually leave a comment on this "new and improved" system? I was able to, but it took some sorting out.

Thanks for the input.

On the ninth day of Halloween

On the ninth day of Halloween, the Great Pumpkin gave to me:
Our very own copy of Goodnight Goon;
a plastic moon* and a witch on a broom;
and a vintage clown costume.

Like how I did that post Goodnight Moon style? Ha, I crack myself up. :-)

*I have no clue what these things are. They are marked Hong Kong, so I am guessing 1980's or so? They are about the size of my palm, and have no hooks or anything for hanging.

On the tenth day of Halloween

Today is the first day of my Great Pumpkin series. Ideally I would be able to make this the thirteen days of Halloween, but with Jack's birthday being on the 19th, I can never really fit in more than 10 days. Oh well, 10 days of Halloween is still plenty of fun!

So, on the tenth day of Halloween, the Great Pumpkin gave to me:
One feathery eyeball wreath.
I've been in love with feather wreaths for Halloween for years now, and even attempted to make my own only to discover that I can't find orange or scary green feather boas anywhere. Dave spotted two of them at a garage sale for me this summer. This one was plain, I added eyeballs to it.
And one finished coiled fabric bowl for the scrap challenge hosted at JC Handmade .
It's a tiny thing. And to be honest, after seeing all the lovely products of other crafters I have a bit of an inferiority complex about it. LOL

Oh well, it is what is, right? :-)

I can't wait to see what the Great Pumpkin brings tomorrow...

Three ring circus

The birthday carnival was a HUGE success. It was a crazy amount of work though, and our pictures are not great since we were working from 8 in the morning until 2 in the afternoon. We were still working as the guests were arriving! Here is a small taste of it:
A funny picture taking booth;
game booths on the fence;
a favorite booth amongst the kids - tattoos (some kids had 7 or 8 tattoos, lol);
miles and miles of bunting, complete with triangles made from an old circus themed crib sheet;
striped lanterns in the trees;
plenty of carnival food - circus peanuts, caramel apples, popcorn, cotton candy, hot dogs;
birthday cupcakes baked in ice cream cones (the kids were CRAZY about these);
and the prize table, where the kids could trade their tickets for prizes of their choosing. (There were no prize values or rules. If a kid had 2 tickets and wanted 2 balls, I let them have whatever they wanted.)

We also played games: pillow case races, egg and spoon races, and musical clown noses. (I.E. Musical chairs with clown noses instead of chairs.)

The best part? 10 kids were entertained for 3 hours all on their own. The booths were easy enough for them to regulate on their own, and I just let them take tickets/not take tickets as they pleased. The adults were able to visit (and eat! I think the adults loved the junk food more than kids) and just enjoy.

It was a great party, and if you need a kids party idea, I cannot recommend this idea enough!

Hapde Burfday Baby

My Dearest Jack,

Today you are 4. I will fully admit that there have been many days this past year when I wasn't sure it would ever get here. Wow, what a year it was.

For me, one of the best and worst parts of parenting is that time keeps on ticking. Somehow we keep marching forward, through good and bad. One of nature's best evolutionary tactics perhaps?
You have done a lot of amazing work this year. You've learned how to spell, how to read, how to write, how to count to 100, how to dress yourself, how to use the potty, how to make friends, and so much more.

You've started to dream of bigger things: driving cars (to buy your own candy), eating cake for dinner (good luck to you there!), being a fireman or a race car driver, going to kindergarten (and wondering if mommies go with their babies, sniff), and plenty of other things too.
You've struggled a lot too. Are you a baby or a big kid? How can you be independent from me? Where do you draw the line between doing what is asked of you and being your own person?

And there have been tears. Oceans and oceans of tears.

I guess it's been hard to imagine you are a person separate from mommy and daddy, eh?
In years past there have only been glimpses of the man you will be. This year I am pretty certain I can see that man *right* there...what traits are here to stay, which are passing fads. Four years in there seems to be little doubt about who you are.

And you are still my sunshine.

I love you baby boy. (Yes, I know, you aren't a baby, you are kid now.)

I hope that the coming year brings more peace of mind and less struggle. An easier journey to number five is certainly well deserved this year. (And yes, I also know you want the numbers to go faster and that you won't eat salad until you are 61, but let's just get used to number four first, ok?)

With all my love,

Mama