HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!!

Just wanted to wish everyone the Happiest of Halloweens!!!

I got my first award... from my sweet sister!!

My cute sister, Karin from the other half of the Style Sisters, gave me this award and I am so honored!!! She along with our mother have taught me everything I know! So really I owe alot to her!! How fun this is for me :o) I have enjoyed blogging so much. I love to share with others fun things that I see or do! I love getting other ideas from others as well! I need to list 6 things that I love and give the award to some other creative people out there! So lets see...

1. My family, I can not imagine life without my precious husband Kelly and kids...Elli, Conner, Turner and Landon!

2. Blessings... WAY TOO MANY TO LIST!

3. Being a stay at home mom!!! It is the best!!

4. Friends that I can rely on ALL the time!

5. Being creative...sewing, making things out of nothing, painting, decorating, making yummy treats!

6. Having this fun blog!

Now for awards to other amazing people in the blogging world:

Farmer Julie - for her sweetness and her amazing way with clay and flowers! I found her blog through my sister who just happened to stumble upon it and it turns out that I used to work for Julie's flower shop in So. Cal when I was in high school!!! It is a small world! You will have to visit her sweet little blog!

Lemon Drop Studio - she makes adorable cards and has very cute things on Etsy. She has been a follower of The Childrens Nest and I appreciate it so much! Check out her fun stuff!

Just a Girl - she is super creative and is one of the funniest girls around!! She does some very cute things on a budget and I love it!

Fun and easy decor for pumpkins & cupcakes...

This is our favorite witch pumpkin... if you want to have fun with the pumpkin without carving it. I used pins to attach the candy, takes a little time but sooo worth it! The hat is made from black cardstock. Got these ideas from my Martha Stewart kids magazine that is no longer in print (BUMMER)

Here are our scary monster and witch cupcakes... all made with candy, marshmallows and ice cream cones (could not find chocolate cones...They are cuter with chocolate but hey, my kids don't care, they love them regardless :o)

ONLY 4 DAYS LEFT!!!!!!!!!

How fun are these Halloween Pops!

I am loving these special little treats! I just don't know where to find the black and white candy sticks... I must look harder I think! How fun to give these to kids in your child's classroom or to give to the teacher! Here is how to make the skull pop:

Skull Pop
To make a skeleton head, you'll need two regular marshmallows. With scissors, cut one marshmallow widthwise to expose stickiness and make pieces for the head and jaw. Poke holes with a toothpick to make sticky spots for eyes, teeth, and nose. Poke white candy-coated licorice pastels into jaw for teeth, and press in black licorice drops for eyes. Snip a piece of black licorice twist into a small triangle for the nose, and press into place. Poke a few times with the toothpick into marshmallows to make a large hole for a candy stick. Push candy stick into hole, through jaw, and into skull. Wrap in cellophane bag if desired.

The How To's of Making a Paper Bag Pumpkin!!!

Isn't this fun and cute? Well it is super easy and cheap to make and your kids will have fun helping you make these!

Items needed:

Paper bags

masking tape

newspaper

floral tape (Walmart has this in their floral section for 1.97 for 3 rolls!)

orange spray paint

ivy leaves or any kind of greenery

Ok, you start with a large grocery bag from the grocery store...

Next, you cut off the bottom retangular piece so that you have a tube that is open on both ends.

Then you take the whole thing and crinkle it as much as you can.





Next, gather one end as tightly as you can and secure it with masking tape.





Now you push the end you just taped up through and turn it inside out so that the taped part will be inside the pumpkin and the words will also be on the inside.





Now you have what looks kind of like a bowl.





Now fill that with crinkled up newspaper (about 3 whole pages crinkled up)







Gather up the bag and tape it just like you did earlier and try to twist the top, if you can (it is kind of thick), before you wrap the tape around it.

Take it outside and spray paint it orange and let it dry, if it is sunny it shouldn't take very long at all. Then take floral tape and wrap it around the "stem", around the masking tape. Add some greenery to the stem as shown in the first picture and you are done!! These are so fun for Halloween but also for the Thanksgiving table! You can make these in little sizes too, the lunch bag sizes :o)

Look at this darling Halloween giveaway from "My Remodeled Nest"...

Isn't this fun?? I just made a new friend named Ruth Ann from "My Remodeled Nest" and she has a cute little blog and she is offering this adorable giveaway!! You too can win, you just need to leave her a comment and then post a little something about her great giveaway on your blog! Check it out here and GOOD LUCK!!

Look at these cute Yummy Mummies...

Aren't these the cutest mummies?? They are very easy to make! CLICK HERE for the easy directions! I hope you are having fun getting ready for Halloween!!!!!

I love this cake!!

I found this on MARTHA'S website but the directions are a little vague. So what I think is that you could make a three layer cake, either from a box or from scratch and then frost it with white frosting and then use large and small marshmallows to create the ghosts! I think this would be so much fun to serve at a Halloween party for kids! I also love the black candles and cake plate!!

Learn how to make this super fun Halloween Tote for your little one.....

(picture is from Country Living Mag)

Do you love? I love working with felt and so I thought this little Halloween tote was sooo cute! Click here if you like it too :o)

Fun homemade Knight & Dragon Costumes....

Aren't these the funnest costumes? The knight costume is made from aluminum foil, foil roasting pan, foil pie pan, kitchen sponges, foil candy cups a box of brads! Click here if you are interested in making up these adorable costumes.

Ghosts in the Graveyard...yummy dessert!

Another way to get your kids excited about Halloween....

GHOSTS IN THE GRAVEYARD!

This has now become a tradition for our family! Every year at the very beginning of October we make this yummy dessert that I saw in a magazine years ago! My kids get sooooo excited when this comes to the table :o) Here is the recipe:

1 pkg. (16 oz.) chocolate sandwich cookies

3-1/2 cups cold milk

2 pkg. (4-serving size each) JELL-O Chocolate Flavor Instant Pudding & Pie Filling

1 tub (12 oz.) COOL WHIP Whipped Topping, thawed

CRUSH cookies in zipper-style plastic bag with rolling pin or in food processor.POUR cold milk into large bowl. Add pudding mixes. Beat with wire whisk 2 minutes. Let stand 5 minutes. Stir in 3 cups of the whipped topping and 1/2 of the crushed cookies. Spoon into 13x9-inch baking dish. Sprinkle with remaining crushed cookies.REFRIGERATE 1 hour or until ready to serve. Store leftover dessert in refrigerator.To Decorate Graveyard: Use Milano cookies to make the "tombstones." Stand tombstones on top of dessert with candy corn and pumpkins or just fun Halloween sprinkles. Drop dollops of remaining whipped topping onto dessert to make "ghosts."Makes 15 to 18 servings

HAVE A FUN TIME!

Adorable and Do-able ~Witch Cupcakes~

FOUND THESE ADORABLE WITCH CUPCAKES AND HAD TO SHARE... these are from Martha but I changed the amount to 24 because that is usually a school class size. She had them as only making 12. If you want her original recipe, click here...

Ingredients
Makes 24
48 brown mini M&Ms plus , more for filling (optional)
Chocolate cupcakes
Vanilla frosting tinted light green

24 chocolate sugar cones
1 + pound black licorice laces, cut into 1/4-inch, 1/2-inch and 2-inch lengths
24 candy corns
Directions
Using a melon baller, scoop out the center of each cupcake, and fill with mini M&Ms, if desired.
Cover the tops of each cupcake with a generous mound of frosting. Insert one candy corn into each cupcake to form a nose. Using brown mini M&Ms, insert two into each cupcake to form eyes. Place two short lengths of licorice above the eyes to form eyebrows for the witch. Place the shorter licorice lengths above the eyebrows to form bangs. Place an inverted cone on top of bangs, pressing gently into buttercream to adhere. Place the longer licorice lengths under the cone hat to form the hair.

One of the cutest costumes for mom and baby!

HOW CUTE IS THIS? I wish I would have seen this about 4 years ago when my youngest little guy was a baby! Those are stuffed black socks attached to the baby to look like spider legs! I think the woman has black string attached to her skirt to look like a web. GENIUS! I love this! Click here for the baby costume instructions! Got any fun costume ideas.... please share them with me, I love to hear of creative costumes!!

Gigantic spider for your window!

We made two of these two years ago and they are such a huge hit! We put one on our window and one on our fence! They are made with a milk jug, pipe foam (from the hardware store and not too expensive), black duck tape and a few other embellishments! Click here to make him!

More fun decor for outside your homes...

General Bone E. Part... from our yard (if I can make this, anyone can) Click here to find out how to make this adorable skeleton from Family Fun

"The Pumpkin Friend"



Here is another favorite from our house, "The Pumpkin Friend" as my kids call it. When my 7 year old son, Turner, saw this for the first time when he was about 3 he used to sneak outside and I would look out the window and see him sitting right next to the Pumpkin Friend talking to him. It was the cutest thing ever! Now my 5 year old, Landon, loves to do the same thing!

This is how we make him...

Find some old adult sized overalls from the thrift store or your closet and an old checkered or plaid button down shirt and stuff them with newsper until it is nice and plump. Put the overalls on over the shirt. I then take some raffia and stuff it into the neck and in the cuffs of the shirt and the bottom of the legs and then use a rubber band to tie the ends of the arms and the legs (so that the raffia doesn't come out) Then sit a store bought fake pumpkin that lights up right on top of the raffia where the neck would be and sit him where everyone can see him and your done!!! You will get cute comments from all the neighbors!!

Tomorrow I will tell how to make the GIANT Spider on my window (yet another creation from Family Fun)........ Come back then :o)

Want to make some cute bats out of black socks in about 15 mins?

Here is Landon with our finished bats!!


Here they are on our tree!


Here are the ones from BHG.com. These are so simple and fast!! Just thought I would show you all this fun craft! Click here to see how to make them!!

Looky what I just found!!

DO YOU LOVE THESE GHOSTS???

I just found these cute ghosts on Parent Magazine's website but no directions! SOOOO, what I think is that they are done similar to the ones I made (the four ghosts holding hands). They way I made mine was pretty easy! I took newspaper and formed a ball shape and made the head... I then took a 3/4 inch dowel and stuck it into the newspaper...I took a white sheet (these can be found for about $2.96 - $3.96 for a twin flat at Walmart or you can find them at thrift stores too)I wrapped the sheet around the head and then tied it at the neck with black ribbon and then connected several ghosts together as if they were holding hands. I put them into the ground around my microscopic apple tree but if you have a big tree that is even better!! The way they did it (I think) is they took styrofoam balls and stuck dowels into them. It is cuter with the balls but those things are EXPENSIVE!! Also they cut out the eyes with felt or someting... I just took a sharpie and drew faces on mine. It also looks to me like they used cheesecloth or somewhat of a sheer fabric to make the ghost which is cute too! So I guess whatever your budget situation is you can do either.... I LOVE HALLOWEEN!! Let me know what fun things you are doing for Halloween Decor!