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     One place I feel like I failed  as a mother is at enjoying Halloween.  It was never really that important to me, so my kids usually had last minute, thrown together costumes to go out trick or treating in.  Once in awhile I would make or buy something that would be passed down from year to year and repurposed, but not often. I wanted Halloween to be fun for them, I just wasn't that into it to give it a lot of fore thought and time. Consequently, the holiday for me was just exhausting and probably disappointing to my kids.  Surprisingly, most of my children have embraced Halloween as adults and really come up with some fun ideas and costumes.  Perhaps if I had been more like they are now, I would have planned ahead and Halloween wouldn't have been so exhausting for me.  
     My DIL told me last month what she was planning as a costume for my young grandson.  They usually do a family theme and last year they all went as Moana characters.  LIttle Spencer was Maui! My son was that giant turtle that loves shiny things and DIL was Moana.  They were adorable.  And, this year, even though Lindsey doesn't love Halloween that much, she is getting into it for the sake of her daughter and has their costumes planned.  
      How about you? It is mid-September and time to get into thinking about your kids costumes, and your own if you do that, not to mention parties and decorations.  Don't be a bad Halloween mom like I was! I'm here to help you! 

Costumes:

•     Last year, Alicia had already recognized the need for planning ahead, and shared these last minute costume ideas.  But, they don't have to be last minute! They are so cool and if you spend more time on them, they could be even cooler! 
• Disney characters are popular costumes for those who don't like scary. Our Mouse Ear tutorial will help you out and save you money!
• On Friday Faves last year we shared some of our past costume ideas that might get you started with some costume ideas of your own! 

Decorations:

• Last year, Maddy, who loves Halloween, shared 3 Fall Wreaths.  This one was my personal favorite and the most Halloweenish I think.  
• Last week I shared how to use old pill bottles to make a string of spooky lights! 
• Alicia gave us some tips for throwing a Halloween party on this post.  There are some awesome decorations suggested!  

     Of course, many of our supplies come from Dollar Tree! 

Food:

• You may just want some simple cookies for a kids party, or even let the kids do the decorating!  Here is a simple way to do it. 
• For your own friends, Lindsey shared some great Halloween themed appetizers. They look gooey and creepy, but taste great! 
• The previously mentioned post by Alicia also has some fun Halloween food ideas. 

Activities:

     If you have ever wanted to throw a Murder Mystery party, Halloween is the perfect time to do it!  The Dating Divas have one all ready for you! ​It includes everything you need to host a party of your own - invitations (customized to each character), biographies, task cards, decor, awards...it's the whole package! Here is a more detailed list, courtesy of the Divas:
Hosting Ideas & Suggestions to make party planning a breeze.
Invitations personalized for each character with costume ideas.
Character Biographies to set the stage and story.
Name Tags to identify each unique character.
Table Cards & Food Tents to use if playing over dinner.
Task Cards for the characters to complete in each round.
Evidence Pieces to add intrigue and suspense!
Voting Ballots and Awards to vote for your favorite characters & suspects.
and much MORE!

• Here is a list of favorite card games that would be fun for any party!
• This post has 10 Great Party Games that our family loves to play! 

     OK! Now get started! If you plan ahead you can help your kids and  yourself ​have a terrific Halloween this year!

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     For a couple of years now, I have been saving pill bottles.  I hate to just throw them into the land fill and I figured there must be a crafty way to recycle them. Guess what!  I came up with a way! 
      Every year for Halloween, our church does a chili cook-off  with grilled hot dogs out in the back parking lot, and then we open our trunks and many people decorate them for the holiday and the kids go around Trunk or Treating.  It is a lot of fun and give the kids a safe place to celebrate with people they know.  And, actually, we attract people from around the neighborhood as well! 
       Well, like I said, many people decorate their cars.  I always want to, and I have done a few little things, but frankly when my kids were young, it was all I could do just to get them costumed!  But, now that I am an empty nester, all I have to worry about is decorating my car!  So far, I've come up with this cute little lighted garland.  
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     Seriously, kids would have so much fun doing these.  Here is how I did it. 

• I used a battery powered string of LED lights.  Mine already had hearts on them, so I easily pulled those off and made sure to have my husband drill the holes in the caps the same size as they are in the hearts so that the lights fit in tightly.  My husband said that the caps are stronger plastic than you might think and they took some effort to drill. There are 10 lights on my strand, much like these. 
• For the ghosts, I just painted everything white and put random shapes of tape to make the eyes and mouths.  Then, after giving a couple of coats of paint, I peeled the tape off.  
• Since the pill bottles are already orange, I just painted black eyes and mouths on the pumpkins and painted the caps green.
• When you paint, give a few coats because it is hard for the paint to stick to the plastic.  I just used regular acrylic paint.  
• Put batteries in your light power pack and stick the lights in the lids and Voila! 

     This garland should light up the hatch of my car pretty well, along with a real Jack-O-Lantern or two.  Now I shall see where else my mind wanders for the decorations this year! 

     It is getting to be that fun time of year again with loads of activities for the little ones with all of the holidays coming!  A really nice gift for grandparents are those photo books!  My son and DIL gave my husband and I one of our grandson's first year and we absolutely love it!  I am thinking of compiling one with all of my grandchildren together.  
     Mixbooks looks like a great company for doing just that.  I have heard many recommendations for them. Have any of you tried their books?   When you sign up for their site, you get up to 50% off.  They have 405 themes that you can use, or you can start from scratch and totally build your own theme.  I think this company is worth checking out! Let me know your experiences if you have already used them. 

This post contains affiliate links. I will be compensated for any purchases made through those links at no additional cost to you. Thank you for your support!

       I was never one to spend a lot of money on some store bought costumes for my kids.  If there were clearance items or sales, I would occasionally purchase those, but usually we just tried to be creative with my fabric stash and by re-purposing past costumes. Every year we would pull out our Halloween box and think about what we could do with what we had and I would make a few new items to please the kids and their big ideas.  We came up with some fun ones over the years, so today we are going to give you a few more costume ideas as we talk about past faves  on our 38th Friday Faves! 

​What Was Your Favorite Halloween Costume?

     If you look at the photo above, you are looking at my 3 youngest children.  That is Maddy being a fairy, Little Jake in the pumpkin costume and 4th grader Alicia dressed as a gypsy! None of those costumes were picked as favorites, but Maddy said that she loved all of her costumes and could hardly choose.  She did look pretty cute, didn't she?

     Alicia says that her favorite costume was when I made her up to be Esmeralda from the Hunchback of Notre Dame.  She was in the 2nd grade.  I had sewn a bunch of little coin-like bangles on her skirt and she loved those jingly things.  She said that there were a couple of other girls in Esmeralda Costumes, but they were purchased from the store and their coins were printed on.  She liked her's better. 
​     You can still purchase that movie on DVD, here.

     One year, when Lindsey was very small, I made here a Tinkerbell costume! She looked adorable in it and I think she wore it 2 years in a row, she loved it that much.  

  The fun thing is that now my granddaughter just told me that she loves Amelia Bedelia books, so I will have to show her this picture of me acting the part.  

Here are a few other costumes our family has done:

• We used a box when one of  our sons was 3 and covered it in shiny paper and used stickers to put on lights and buttons and made him into a robot! 
• I made another son a padded shell with a belt around his waist and a piece of blue cloth around his forehead and he became a Ninja Turtle.
• Our oldest son came home with a bunch of black cloth and I made him a huge shroud with a hood.  It looked so awesome on him.
• His family (I think there were 3 kids at the time) all dressed up as pirates, except the baby who was dressed as a parrot and sat on my son's shoulder! 
• Alicia made her son into a spider last year, using black painted pool noodles as the 4 extra legs.  She used black sweat shirt and pants and put glow sticks on his arms and legs to help him be see. He was so cute! Mommy and Daddy were the spider web with white web painted on black t-shirts! 

     You will see a lot of posts about last minute costume ideas.  I feel like ours were always last minute, but they were pretty fun!  What do you remember about costumes you loved?  Share them with us in the comments!  
​     Have a Happy Halloween! 
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