Two Girls, Two Elaborate Skeletons

This comes directly on the heels of Halloween, but it isn't really a "Halloween" activity, except that, you know, it involves skeletons and I got the idea from somebody else who was doing it as a Halloween activity. So okay, it's probably a Halloween activity, but we did it more in terms of human biology than Halloween.

So there you go.

Anyway...I was inspired by the skeleton puzzle over at Chasing Cheerios enough to dig out (after Halloween, of course) a really cool pdf of another put-together skeleton that I had downloaded and saved almost two years ago. Do you do that? See cool stuff on the internet and save it, even if you don't know when/if you'll ever do anything with it? I have an external hard drive, with something like a terrabyte of space on it, pretty much just for that and my itunes and my digital photography compulsion.

So two years ago I found this really cool skeleton pdf online, meant to be put together with brads as a Halloween decoration but pretty detailed as to its bones and stuff, and I saved it to my hard drive. And yesterday, I printed out two copies of that skeleton and gave it to the girls to color. The girls get really perfectionist and self-judgmental when it come to cutting, for some reason, so they made me cut all the pieces out. Which I did. I'll have to think about whether or not I should go cold turkey on the cutting assists in the future.

And today I got out some of my cheap stash scrapbook paper (I just remembered that I should have used my huge sample book of super-brittle wallpaper that I got from the Upcycle Exchange and that almost ruined my Cricut, it was so brittle. Shoot) and let the girls pick out pretty papers, then gave them glue sticks to glue the skeleton parts to the back of the pretty paper. While I cut that out (again), I gave them each a page on which I'd printed all five pages of that same skeleton all teeny-tiny on one page. They colored the teeny-tiny skeleton parts and I cut them out (ugh).

The girls arranged the big skeleton pieces, colored and backed with pretty scrapbook paper, sandwiched in the pockets of laminate, and we laminated them. Then, while I cut out those laminated pieces (definitely going cold turkey on the cutting assists), the girls glued their teeny-tiny skeleton to a new piece of cardstock, which we also laminated. Sydney made a lovely abstract arrangement of bones, but Willow made, as I encouraged her to, a teeny-tiny skeleton put together correctly to use as a key in putting together the large skeletons.

I had wondered if the whole fun of this activity would be in the creation, but the girls actually then spent quite a bit of time on the floor together putting together their skeletons. I had also assumed that each child would put together one skeleton, but I was pleased to walk by later and see that they were both working together on both skeletons:

And making them hold hands, no less, and go for a walk together.

Such friends that sisters can be sometimes.

Another Halloween for the Record Books

The clown costume was FINALLY finished:I could write books about that yarn wig, let me tell you. And the logistics of actually SEWING, on the sewing machine, with two little girls whose heads are about to explode, they're so excited. Made my head just about explode, too, if you know what I mean. But I digress.

The pumpkins were finally finished, too:

Although Matt had to take over that one after 1) I decided it would be a good idea to try to carve using my Dremel but without the Dremel pumpkin carving kit and turned the livingroom into a pumpkin slaughterhouse and 2) it was discovered, a little too late, that Willow's pumpkin was starting to go bad on the inside and, you may remember, I've had a little thing about smells and just grossness in general after being hyperemetic during both my pregnancies. Matt is now, officially, the yearly Pumpkin Parent.

Makeup was applied judiciously:
And then, with great glee, not so judiciously. Made Will a bit more of a horror film clown than I'd been expecting, but it worked.

It was a perfect night for trick-or-treating:
Our stickers were not exactly the hot item of the neighborhood (One kid, seeing Matt about to drop a handful in his bag, actually pulled his bag away and quickly said, "Uh, no thanks"), but we didn't get egged, either, so there you go.

Of course, all our neighbors are more awesome than we are, so OUR kids got plenty of candy.

Even some candy to share:
When they're too old to share candy, I figure they're old enough to start making their own costumes, don't you think?

With my kids, hopefully it'll never come to that.

One Deer Down, One Clown to Go

This year for Halloween, my baby wanted to be a "baby deer." Good luck finding yourself a toddler fawn costume at a costume shop, but we are crafty people, and we can make that happen:
Once again, as with Willow's zebra costume last Halloween, I used a long-ago thrifted Old Navy fleece romper as a pattern to sew a Sydney-sized romper out of tan stash fabric. I even sewed in a zipper, for goodness' sake--
--referring back to a handy zipper tutorial or two (the glue stick method=AWESOME!).

I ironed some stash white flannel to Heat n' Bond iron-on adhesive, freehand cut it into fawn spots, and had the girls help me lay out the spots-- --and then iron them down. And also? I am NEVER buying Heat n' Bond adhesive again. I thought it would be quicker just to bond the applique to the romper instead of sewing each one down. What I forgot is that heat-set applique is fiddly, in that you have to, you know, follow the RULES for it, and I have the constant companionship and assistance of two small children. What the use is of something that a three-year-old can't do correctly I just don't know. At least when you sew something on the sewing machine with a three-year-old, even if the stitches are sloppy or the seam wobbles, that thing at least has a fighting chance of STAYING SEWN. Heat n' Bond? Blech. I'm sorry, Heat n' Bond, that I was incapable of ironing you down with moderate heat for 8-10 seconds per section, overlapping slightly, but seriously, you're going to fall apart on me?

Seriously?

I've already had to take a glue stick to about half of these appliques after my child was instructed to show up at her gymnastics class in costume, so we'll see if the damn things last through tomorrow's school party and the Bloomington Area Birth Services party and the pipe organ concert, and Saturday's festival at the Mather's Museum.

Oh, and trick-or-treating. Can't forget that.

Anyway, the applique was simple to do before sewing the romper up, but I wish I'd taken the time to actually do them right.

I freehanded and sewed up a tail and attached it to the outside of the costume (it's white on the underside, because Sydney's a white-tailed deer fawn)--
--but I used a pattern for the hood of the deer costume, a vintage Simplicity 5739 that I scored during the Upcycle Exchange at Strange Folk in September. Hopefully, when the girls are between the ages of 10 and 12, they'll really want to dress up as some sort of faux-fur rompered creature with a tail and a furry hood with ears, because that's what this pattern is for. I freehanded the ears, but fortunately the hood, even though it's super-large, still fits fine:

Even skipping all the niceties that I ran out of time for, such as trimming the neckline with bias tape or lining the hood or adding elastic to the wrist and ankle hems, etc., I'm still quite pleased with the outcome, and fortunately, so is Syd.

And if all her applique does fall off before Saturday, I can always just fashion her some pipe cleaner antlers and make her a buck, I guess.

Autumn in Indiana

What does Sydney have in her hands?A ladybug, of course:But if that one's too hard for you to see, just look around--there are approximately a billion ladybugs all over everything.

One kid likes to swing low:One kid likes to swing high:I like the view straight up towards the sky:The hill currently being used for careening down like maniacs on bicycles will, in a couple of months, be used for careening down like maniacs on sleds:But as long as they can careen around somewhere like maniacs, they're happy enough:

About Those Halloween Candy Houses...:A Tutorial

As I thought they would be, the Halloween houses were the hit of the children's Halloween party. The gingerbread house's redneck cousin, the Halloween house isn't for a child too under the thumb of the sugar police, but it's really not the sugar orgy you'd expect. Frankly, I like to encourage my children to use food, especially candy, as art supplies--you still get much of the same sensory pleasures as you would eating the candy, but it allows an entirely new way to experience the candy that is creative and aesthetic instead of gluttonous.

But yes, they do eat quite a bit of candy while making these Halloween houses, so you have been warned.

The color scheme of the Halloween house is primarily black and orange--you can do a full-on "haunted" Halloween house with an older kid, but I clearly do not have that kind of kid yet. The beauty of the color scheme, however, is that it leads you straight into the awesomest kind of candy--chocolate.

For the infrastructure of the house, we usually go with chocolate graham crackers, but anything chocolate will do. Think about any kind of chocolate cookies, chocolate Little Debbies or other snack cakes, chocolate ice cream cones (they make super turrets), chocolate candy bars, chocolate doughnuts.

You could use icing for these, like you do with gingerbread houses, and some colors of icing would look really cool here, but I like to use peanut butter instead. It's super sticky, super easy to apply, and it's one less super-sweet thing for the kids to shove in their mouths while they work:
When I set this activity up for a party, I spoon peanut butter out into little bowls for each kid, and give them a popsicle stick for application. It works perfectly. I also give each kid a paper plate to build the house on, just so that each kid can take her house home. The paper plate leaves enough work area that the kids usually make little candy yards for their houses, as well.

And when I do this for a party, I usually ask each person attending to bring a small bag of something edible for decorating the house, to share with everyone else. This makes for a good variety. Some of my favorites:

• pretzels
• raisins
• candy corn and candy corn pumpkins
• marshmallows (they make good ghosts)
• Reese's Pieces
• gummy anything, especially worms
• novelty candy items, such as candy bones or spiders or whatever

One kid brought Jelly Bellies to our party this weekend, and they turned out to be a huge hit--each kid really liked picking out specific colors to use in their own art installations. One kid made a swimming pool using only the blue Jelly Bellies, for instance, and one kid made a grassy yard with the green ones, and one kid made "a big puddle of blood for the witch to fall in."

Ahem.

Other awesome people who also make Halloween houses (amazing how you can think that you invented something, and then here comes the internet to disabuse you of such naive notions):

• Make and Takes
• Amazing Moms
• How Stuff Works
• My Little Gems

The only other picky things I do are to ask the party kids to wash their hands before they begin, and to clean up and hide all the candy supplies as soon as everyone is done. Because you get kind of sick of candy when you're playing with it and it's right in your face, but run off to do a little pumpkin pounding or dress-up or whatever, and ten minutes later you'll find yourself thinking, "Hmmm, I wonder if there are any more Reese's cups over there?"

Which there totally are, because even though I packed up all the candy for Matt and BEGGED him to take it to work with him, he forgot (HOW could you forget candy?).

I really should probably go eat those last Reese's cups, now that I think of it.

Pumpkin Pounding and Haunted Houses: A Children's Halloween Party

Some jack-o-lantern oranges, with grapes and apples inside:
Never make these, by the way--they're fiddly and it's nigh on impossible to get the orange flesh out of the peel without having a nervous breakdown. It was much better when I got frustrated and asked the girls to just draw jack-o-lantern faces on whole oranges, which we later peeled and segmented like normal.

Pumpkin-carrot muffins baked in an autumn-themed silicone muffin mold:

I doubled a pumpkin-carrot muffin recipe I found at Daily Unadventures of Cooking, only I used whole eggs instead of egg whites, which I have deemed fiddly. I wasn't sure if I liked these right after I made them--I can always taste the baking powder in the stuff I bake, it seems, even if I've actually followed the recipe--but I had them again for breakfast this morning and they're delicious.

Making Halloween houses (or gardens, or adventure places, or obstacle courses, depending on the child--more on that later):Making, very, very ELABORATE Halloween houses:
Then chilling out with a little light coloring:Pounding the heck out of an innocent pumpkin (more on that later, too):And then running off all that sugar over at the neighborhood playground:
Here's to a successful Halloween party and an early bedtime!

And a Tie Fighter to Sit On

Today is the birthday party for the kiddo of a mom friend, and frankly, I found it refreshing to craft for a change for a kiddo who's way into not unicorns or rainbows, but STAR WARS!!! Not that there's anything wrong with unicorns or rainbows, but now that you mention it, I AM a bit played out of the "let's pretend there's a unicorn and we ride it and it uses its magical horn to take us all over the rainbow to Candyland" game.

The Star Wars web site, sort of oddly, has a section for Star Wars-themed kids' crafts, and in that section I found some Star Wars stencils that are ostensibly to be used for pumpkin carving. But I'm hell not going to waste my 8.5x11" freezer paper sheets (my computer is finicky, so I daren't cut the freezer paper myself for it) on a pumpkin, so instead I dug around in Willow's shirts drawer to find a shirt that she doesn't often wear because it's not "beautiful," and I made the birthday kiddo a Stormtrooper shirt:
Awesome, right? I am VERY pleased with how it turned out.

When I do freezer paper stencilling, I actually end up preferring the negative stencil image almost every time (Do you know how to do freezer paper stencilling? One stencil will give you two images--one positive and one negative), and so, since I also didn't want to create a plastic bin for "half-used freezer paper stencils" in my so-organized study/studio, I found one of Matt's work shirts sitting unsuspectingly in his closet, and put the negative Stormtrooper image there:

Do you think he'll be able to wear it to work?

Sponge brushes work best for freezer paper stencils, in my opinion, and are also best used with the best-quality fabric paint that you can afford. I use a basic set of Jaquard Neopaque that's lasted me for way over a year now, and when that finally runs out I'll probably buy the exact same thing, only with more colors. When I make a negative stencil image, I like the outside edge to look like it has brush marks, but the way you actually do that with a sponge brush is actually just to dab, not brush. Now you know.

Then, of course (because you KNOW that if I'm going to make one thing I might as well just make a dozen), I decided that I couldn't fancy up shirts for other people and not fancy up any shirts for my babies, so Sydney got a castle----which she insisted on trying on even though it hadn't been heat-set yet, and then threw a fit when I wouldn't let her model it while jumping on the bed on account of the bed was covered in organized stacks of clean laundry.

Willow got the negative castle: See? I just think it always looks better!

And so THEN I got all irritated that I always make stuff for other people and never make anything for myself, so I stencilled a Tie Fighter on the butt of my jeans--

--and I didn't want to waste the negative, of course, so I ruined another one of Matt's work shirts:

Another handy trick: If you have a cheap-o iron like I do, it might actually not get quite hot enough to adequately heat-set fabric paint. I line my ironing surface with aluminum foil, shiny side facing the fabric, and if I'm feeling super-paranoid I also might sometimes put aluminum foil on top of the fabric, too, and then a pressing cloth on top of that. It radiates more heat into the fabric and heat-sets the paint at a more appropriate temperature.

I've never bothered to write a freezer paper stencil tutorial because 1) it's easy and 2) every other blogger and their dog already has one. If you seriously need some hand-holding, however, check out the tutorials on:

• Dabbled
• My Montessori Journey
• Monday Prints
• Neither Hip Nor Funky
• Angry Chicken

Okay, though, as I was just now making that list I thought of all these fiddly little things that I want you to know about freezer paper stencilling, not every point of which is addressed by any one of those tutes (although they're all excellent, but you know how I am with tutorials), so next time I stencil, I'm totally going to write my own tutorial after all.

Now...off to iron the butt of my jeans!