Happy Day After Halloween!

It always seems like such a relief when November 1st rolls around. I am not a fan of Halloween, but I force myself into the spirit of it when the last week of October rolls around, and I feel the pressure to get some Halloween costumes put together, and buy a pumpkin. Because really, it's all about the free candy, and by the end of October I could really go a good 100 Grand and Baby Ruth.

By now my kids know that they are not allowed to have individuality when it comes to costumes. They have become accepting of the mandatory group theme. This year they were super cooperative and really awesome for putting up with me.

The inspiration for the group theme costume came from a Google image search for "group theme costume". This one caught my eye and I made some modifications and improvements to make it appropriate for children.

I think ours turned out better, but that is just my biased opinion.

The Play-Doh color was chosen according to what solid color long-sleeved shirts I had in each kid's size. I had to buy the purple and blue one at Goodwill for $2.70 each. 

I found the Play-Doh Logo doing a Google Image search and printed it out on red paper, again on white paper, and a third time on white paper. For art class one day we cut out the words and glued them onto the red paper, and then we glued the red paper onto the white paper. All that work is definitely not necessary if you have a color printer, but I don't have one, and I don't think I would even be willing to sacrifice all that red ink or toner for Halloween. It went pretty fast with some teamwork.

You can see the yellow container was just a piece of yellow posterboard I bought for $0.25 each at Hobby Lobby. They happened to be on sale the week I bought them. I punched holes in the front and back and criss-crossed grosgrain ribbon that matched their shirts. I already had the ribbon because at one time I bought a whole bunch to make bows for my girls hair but never did. So sometimes it pays off to not follow through with a project. I tied knots to keep the ribbon from slipping through the holes.

For the lids, I had some old bucket lids stored in my garage. I knew I've been keeping them in there for a good reason for the past 6 years.  However, I did see bucket lids at Walmart for $1.17, so it's still rather inexpensive if you don't have a supply of bucket lids. I spray painted them a color. For blue and purple I bought two cheap painter's hats at Hobby Lobby for $0.99 each, I hot glued them to the lid, and spray painted them as well. The spray paint was the most expensive part of the costume at $4.34 a can, but it didn't bother me to spend the money because there is paint left over, and I'm sure I will use it on another project someday, perhaps our homemade Christmas gifts.

For orange, black, white, green, and red I used old pairs of cotton girls tights. I cut off the legs and glued the crotch part to the lid. The tights worked better because they fit tighter around their heads. Wendy said hers was too tight, but she is also known for being a little dramatic. You could also probably use old kids underwear, but I know there aren't any old pairs of underwear in my house that I would be willing to wear on my head.

Trick or Treat buckets

I knew we ate ice cream by the bucket for a reason. I can never get myself to recycle these when we finish one, so I have a stack of them in my garage. I color coded them with matching ribbon because my wisdom spoke to me and predicted there would be mix-ups and arguing at some point during the night. 

 Heidi did't participate in the Play-Doh, but she posed nicely for me. It looks like she's doing the snake.

While we were trick or treating, Bradley turned to me and said, "Mommy, next year can we be something that is at least just a little bit evil?"

Haha! That made me laugh and still does. I thought Play-Doh was evil! 

Now for a fun little Blast to the Past. Our kids always ask us at dinner to tell them a story about when we were little. This month I tried to remember Halloween stories to tell them. Today I went through my old photos and made this collage to show them. The number is my age. I don't know why I'm mising age 8. Either I didn't go trick or treating or we failed to get a picture. Perhaps the film got exposed, or the picture was so bad it didn't make it into the photo album. Huh? Yeah, remember when you couldn't take a billion pictures until you got the perfect shot? You snapped a picture, hoped you didn't blink and got the results a week or two later? I appreciate digital photography and editing a whole lot!

4 - Raggedy Ann
5 - Princess
6 - Bunny
7 - Cheerleader
9 - Drunk Hobo
10 - Grapes
11 - Raggedy Ann (again)
12 - Peter Pan

I'm a little embarrassed by my age 9 costume. I'm thinking it was my mom's idea? But since she is not here to defend herself, I will take the blame and admit that I told my mom I wanted to be a drunk hobo for Halloween. I'm pretty sure I didn't take that bottle with me while I trick or treated, and thank goodness it wasn't foreshadowing into my future. Or was it? ...