How To Throw A Ghoulish Halloween Party For Little Goblins

Themed parties are so much fun and I think overboard is the way to go when it comes to kids parties! And that's exactly what happened today for the Ghoulish Halloween Party for my little goblins! It was so much fun - for me and mum, because the kids are too small to do anything except rip up or eat. But we did everything for them and dreamed of the years ahead when they'll be able to help us make food and decorations!

There were 3 main things we focused on: the decorations, the food, and the fun! And this is how it turned out!

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Starting out the front, our friendly skeleton welcomed guests to our crime-scene front door.

This got giggles from the kiddies before they even got through the door!

The blackboard was decorated with a welcome sign, and above that we spread cobweb (ew, they looked so real!) and spiders on the wall. We also hung my Spider Web Halloween Fabric Wreath (see tutorial here) and the awesome Trashbag Spiderwebs from this How About Orange tutorial!

Mum enjoyed making the webs and went a bit crazy, making them from both black and orange rubbish bags. I personally loved the orange ones so they went on the walls outside. And we made black and orange streamer garland for the playgym. Side-note: I did have balloons on the playgym but they kept popping and freaking me out so I begged mum to pop the remaining ones so that I could stop hiding inside... wierd I know, but balloons scare me!

Anyway, moving on to the table decorations!! On this table we spread 'cobweb' and spiders, and sat all the crafty things I've made/decorated over the last couple of weeks. The pumpkin I carved the other day (see tutorial here) and the purple wreath (see tutorial here) looked really nice as a table dec. I also painted some Kaisercraft wooden letters (BOO) black, that I got from Spotlight. I covered a plain black tub with googly eyes, that I think I got from Coles. And that was for my party favours - I filled rubber gloves with lollies for 'severed hand' party favours, and I made ghost lollipops with tissues and black texta! Oh and I nearly forgot Isla's baby pumpkin - see him hiding in amongst the webs? I don't know how but he somehow ended up looking like a mexican with a handle-bar-moustache! He's so adorable - I haven't got the heart to throw him in the bin!

Handmade table decorations

Severed hand party favours and ghost lollipops

The food table was fun. I went a bit crazy in the Spotlight party section and bought orange plastic tablecloth and matching plastic bowls and serviettes. And I got black plastic plates and serviettes. Do you get the impression that I didn't want to wash any dishes after the party? You'd be absolutely right!!

I drew spiderwebs and ghosts on the tablecloth and wrote B O O on my little chalkboard heart jars that held the cutlery.

Draw words and pictures on tablecloths for fun

Chalkboard heart jars for the cutlery.

Oh and I can't forget the costumes!! What is a themed party without costumes??

Logan was thhhhhhe most adorable vampire I've ever laid eyes on. And Isla absolutely loves Tinkerbell, so I dressed her as an evil fairy. I found a cute orange Boo-tiful t-shirt in Coles and bought a black fairy kit in Toys'R'Us. It had a tulle skirt, wings, a wand, and a headband. And I stumbled upon a Witch Makeup Kit in Woolworths when I was doing the food shopping for the party. It had face crayons that I used to draw scars on her face and neck, and wicked purple and green 'hair chalk'. Who knew such a thing existed? Not me, but I loved it.

Vampire and evil fairy waiting for their guests to arrive.

=l FOOD l=

There were SO many things I wanted to make, but I knew my friends were bringing lots of sweets so I behaved myself. We only made 2 themed foods - the curried-egg-eyeballs and the orange chocolate crackle.

Curried-egg-eyeballs. YuM!

Orange-coloured white chocolate crackle - Double-yum!

A friend brought the best home-made iced biscuits I've ever had! They looked awesome and tasted just like my favourite 100s and 1000s biscuits made by Arnotts (I think). And another friend brought delicious oreo biscuit and cream cheese cakepops!

Halloween iced biscuits - thanks Amy!

Choc cakepops - thanks Carmen!

There was an Halloween cake, and I made orange fruit jellies (that melted pretty quickly in the heat). I cut up veggie sticks for the kids and cooked little red sausages (a must for any kids party - Isla loves them and I noticed about 5 minutes after I put the bowl down, she had one in her mouth and 2 in each hand!). Mum made her AweSomE date slice, and there were dips and crackers, and strawberries and watermelon. YuM.

=l FUN l=

Our ghoulish party guests were only young (around 18 months), so the activities were limited but very successful. The initial favourite was the blackboard - probably because there was a beautifully hand-written welcome message on there that had to be destroyed immediately!

How many ways can I draw on mums sign?

The playgym got a workout.

Does eating count as an activity? Because it sure kept them occupied and required a lot of supervision!

Eating orange choc crackle

And the favourite activity of the day? The paddling pool. What is it about having no clothes on that appeals to toddlers so much? Or was it the water that could be transferred from where it should be to where it shouldn't?

They had fun and that's the main thing, leaving us mums in relative peace to chat, eat naughty foods, and wish that it was socially acceptable to drink wine at 10 o'clock in the morning ;o)

Now it's time to start planning the Christmas party!!!

xx

 

Halloween Tutorial --> How To Carve A Pumpkin In 5 Easy Steps!

Carving pumpkins for Halloween is simple and fun, and takes no time at all! You don't need any fancy equipment or skills. Just a pumpkin, a sharp knife, and a great tutorial full of handy pictures!

So here you go!

Halloween Tutorial --> How To Carve A Pumpkin In 5 Easy Steps

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EQUIPMENT

> Halloween pumpkin

* Pumpkins are made available just before Halloween that are perfect for carving. Not only are they prettier than the regular edible kind, they have a much thinner shell so it's easier to cut in to.

> Sharp knife

> Texta/Pen

> Spoon

> Disposable gloves

> Rubbish bag

> Plastic/disposable table cloth (newspaper would also work fine)

> Scissors

INSTRUCTIONS

STEP ONE: Set up your work station

I got a roll of black plastic from Spotlight years ago (in their party decor section) and it has been useful for so many different things - I'll even use it as a table cloth for the kiddies Halloween party table. Anyway, I cut a strip off to cover Isla's picnic table and got all my gadgets ready to get started.

A blank canvas!

STEP TWO: Draw your template on the pumpkin

I have seen some truly amazing designs on Halloween pumpkins using all sorts of different tools, including drills! Just check out this page on Martha Stewart's Halloween page if you want to learn more about "pumpkin carving tools" and there are some great templates on there too. Some other great sites include The Pumpkin Pile and Pumpkin Masters.

But if you're like me and you just want something easy, fun and won't take hours? Then just stick with me and I'll show you how to carve a funky pumpkin in just 15 minutes!

So, the first thing you want to do is work out which 'facing' of the pumpkin you want to carve. Find the flattest (and nicest looking) angle and work out where the centre point is. Above that, draw the triangle eyes. And under that, draw the squiggle mouth. Don't be concerned about your lines because you'll be cutting around them - and with this in mind make sure you don't draw your face too big. You'll see what I mean as we get further on.

STEP THREE: Cut your pumpkins 'hat' off

I call the top of the pumpkin the 'hat' because you put it back on once you've finished carving. It's like a hat you can take on and off to light your candle/blow it out etc. So with that in mind, it's crucial that you cut the hat on an angle. Check out my photos if you're not sure what I mean.

Remember to BE CAREFUL during this step, to always cut in the direction AWAY from your body and NOT towards any fingers or arms!

I find it useful to kind of use a stabbing motion (sounds gruesome I know!!) and slowly make my way around the pumpkin. This also helps to keep the shape of the hat because trying to slide the knife around - if the pumpkin is tough - can lead to overcutting in the wrong direction. Just take it slow.

So, cut all the way around, making sure you stay at the same height, until you meet back at the starting point. ** It might be useful, if you've never done this before, to start at the back of the pumpkin because joining the cuts can sometimes look a bit ugly!

You might need to go back around with the knife to loosen the hat, I found that the top of my pumpkin was quite thick, as you can see from the pictures, and I just needed to carve through a bit deeper the second time.

Gently pull the hat off.

And if you've still got a lot of the shell visible like I do, just cut a hole in the middle so that you can clean out the pumpkin seeds.

STEP FOUR: CLEAN OUT THE PUMPKIN

This is the slimy step! I used gloves and dug everything out by hand. You could use a spoon if you want - or better yet, get the kids to do it!!!! Mine aren't old enough to clean out without either eating it or smearing it everywhere, so I got it done quicker myself. But what a great way to involve the kids as it doesn't any cutting!

STEP FIVE: Carve out the face

Start with the eyes and cut around the outside of your template lines, like this:

Then cut out the mouth. I started with the top row, then cut out the bottom row, and then joined up the ends.

All done!

Now, all that's left to do is find a tealight candle to sit inside, pop the hat back on and wait until dark to watch your sweet little pumpkin turn into a scary orange monster!

Happy carving everyone!!

 

Spider Web Halloween Fabric Wreath Tutorial

I LOVE fabric wreaths, they are so festive and fun to make!! And did I mention that there is no sewing involved? Yeah, awesome I know. So of course I added them to my list of "required party decorations" for the Goblins Tea Party on Friday.

You would've seen a great Halloween Fabric Wreath Tutorial by Hott Mama In The City in My 10 Favourite Halloween Craft Tutorials last week. AND you would've also seen the Giant Yarn Spider Web tutorial by Dana Made It. I loved them both and I thought they would look even better combined together.

The only major adaptation was the use of an embroidery hoop instead of a florists wire wreath, only because I have heaps of hoops around the place and no idea where I would get a wire wreath from. But either would work. And any size would work too - just adjust your fabric and wool amounts accordingly. I picked a 14" hoop because I wanted a nice big spiderweb with lots of spiders (eek, shudder!).

So here's how I went, combining the fabulous wisdom of both tutorials!

Spider Web Halloween Wreath Tutorial

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YOU WILL NEED

14" Embroidery hoop

Wool for the spider web
Fabric for the strips (approx. 60" / 1.5m in total - see step one for more details)

Plastic spiders for embellishment

50" length of ribbon for a hanging loop ( the length is up to you and where you plan to hang your wreath)
Scissors (or rotary cutter, quilting ruler and cutting mat if you have them)
Craft glue

Materials and Tools

INSTRUCTIONS

STEP ONE: Cut your fabric into strips

You will need at least 300 6" x 1" strips of fabric to cover both inner and outer hoops.

The average fabric is 42" wide and a 6" length will give you approximately 40 strips. So this was perfect for me because I wanted to use 8 fabrics for a mixture of bright plain colours (purple, green, orange and black of course) and prints. And 40 strips multiplied by 8 fabrics gave me approximately 320 strips. I was also lucky because I had all of the fabrics left over from old projects, but if you need to buy fabrics you'll probably have to buy a 25cm/10" minimum and have leftovers yourself. Some places will let you buy a minimum 20cm/8" minimum, so it's worth asking. Nevertheless, excess fabric is always handy for future projects!

Now, for the cutting you can use scissors or even tear the 6" panel and cut the 1" strips. But if you have a quilting ruler and rotary cutters, you'll find the job even easier. As you can see from my picture below, I folded the fabric in half with the fold at the bottom and the selvedges together at the top. I used the ruler to cut a perfect 6" x 21" panel from each fabric.

Cutting the 6" panel from the fold up to the selvedge

I then turned each panel around and cut 1" lengths, giving me approximately 40 6" x 1" strips of each fabric. And the great trick is that because the fabric is folded in half - you're cutting 2 strips at once!

Cutting the 1" strips

When you've finished cutting all the strips up, set them aside in piles to make tying them in order easier later.

STEP TWO: Cut your wool into strips.

To be precise or conservative, you will need 1 x 20" strip, 1 x 30" strip, 6 x 40" strips, and 2 x 50" strips. BUT I just cut 8 x 50" strips and had some leftovers for Isla to play with on the floor! All I did was loop the wool around my left and right hands (like that game we played as kids, except you don't want to go tangling the wool around your fingers) at a length of about 25". Once I got to 8 loops on my left hand, I cut all the ends on my right hand. Perfecto.

See I had a 25" loop that I cut at one end

STEP THREE: Spin your spider web

Find your inner hoop and wool strips. Fold 4 of them in half and tie loop knots at ⅓, ¼, ⅔ and ½ on the hoop.

Then tie the strips off at opposite sides of the hoop, making a + and then an x to form a star. Make sure your knots are tight and cut off the excess wool.

Tied off loops make a star for the foundation of your web

Next make the web rings with the 4 remaining strips of wool. Fold each strip in half and make a loop knot on one of the arms of the web where you'd like the ring to start and end. Hold the wool fairly tight and loop it around each arm, moving clockwise until you get back to the starting point. Tie it off tight and cut off any excess wool.

Handy Tip: I picked a different spot to start each time so that I could hide the knot with a spider.

Making the rings does require some patience because pulling the wool too tight and/or not pulling it enough will result in the ring sliding towards the middle. But I found that with practice it came easier - and it's not a tip but I found that when I'd finished all 4 web rings, it was much easier to redo the ring closest to the centre (this was the hardest one for me to get right).

The first ring is the hardest

Repeat with the remaining wool strips to spin 4 web rings, and don't worry about getting them perfect. I love the different angles.

The finished spider web on the inner hoop

STEP FOUR: Make your inner hoop fabric wreath

This step isn't mandatory but I wanted to cover up the inner hoop and I figured another layer of strips would look even better. So if you want to do the same, line up your fabric strips in the order you want to tie them. Then pour yourself a nice drink and get comfortable because this bit takes the longest.

Start tying your strips around the hoop with the knot on the inside (this is important for when the time comes to fit the hoops together). I found that one knot was enough if pulled tight and I scruffed mine up a bit because I love the look of the loose threads. Keep going until you've covered the whole inner hoop.

* One thing I will mention here is that I didn't push my knots together too tightly because I didn't want to add too much bulk. Basically, the hoops won't fit back together if there is too much bulk from the fabric. So, push the knots together but there's no need to really squeeze them tight as you might with other wreath projects - because remember you're doing 2 layers of strips (one on each hoop).

Nearly finished the inner hoop

STEP FIVE: Make your outer hoop fabric wreath

Now find your outer hoop and what's left of your fabric strips. Again, tie your strips around the hoop with the knot on the outside this time. Push the knots together, but remember not too close.

STEP SIX: Join the hoops together

Now this bit took some work and a bit of elbow grease, thanks to my husband, after hearing my huffing and groaning as I tried to squeeze the two frames together :o). Of course, it all depends on how bulky your knots are and how well you separate your knots. See:

Knots separated to reduce bulk and make it easier to squeeze the frames together

Handy Tip: I found it easier to keep the outer hoop screwed together. I laid it flat on the table and manoeuvred the inner hoop into it - being careful to keep the strips separated so they didn't get stuck in the middle.

Now that they're joined up, you can pull the strips forward and make them look pretty.

Spiders are on their way... eeeeek!!!

STEP SEVEN: Add the creepy spiders

Get your little spiders and work out where you want to place them. As you can see in step three, I strategically placed the knots on the web rings so that my creepy little spiders would cover them up.

Glue the spider embellishments to the web using craft glue and allow to dry.

STEP EIGHT: Add a bow for hanging

You can tie your ribbon any way you want really, and at whatever length you need it to be. I cut a 50" length and tied a bow around the screw clasp at the top of the hoop. I thought this would be stronger than gluing the bow on - especially important with little hands around wanting to pull everything down!

A bright bow for hanging

STEP NINE: Make it look pretty

Make sure all the strips are pulled forward and twisted so that the prints are facing outwards (not a problem if you've used only solids or double-sided prints if such a thing exists?

Finished and awesome

STEP TEN: Hang your new Spider Web Halloween Fabric Wreath!!

Hung up outside, ready for the party!

That looks awesome and I can't wait to see what everyone thinks at the party on Friday!

I actually had so much fun that I decided to make another one for a table setting, what do you think?

A great table setting idea

I used a smaller 10" hoop for this one - quicker and I didn't have a lot of that fabric hanging about. And you can see from the next picture how cute the little hoop looks next to the big hoop!

My two creepy spidy wreaths together

This project was simple and fun and I highly recommend giving it a go!!

Huge thanks to Dana at Dana Made It and Kristina at Hott Mama In The City for inspiring me!!

Happy Halloween everyone xx

 

A New "Happy As Clarry" Bubba Quilt Recipe

I love cooking up new quilts and this one is absolutely gorgeous. Inspired by the Liberty of London print Clarricoates, I'm calling this beautiful bubba quilt "Happy As Clarry". I love this Liberty print - it is bright and funky and includes one of my favourite colour combinations --> Purple, Mustard and Teal.

I found coordinating printed fabrics in the Daydream Fabric Line by Benartex, at Textile Traders, and picked a gorgeous bright teal, mustard and purple from the 100% Homespun Cotton range at Carols of Midland. This quilt is so vibrant, and it's edgy and pretty at the same time. I'm so excited to see it all sewn together.

 

A Bubba Quilt For A Beautiful Baby Girl

I couldn't wait to give this gorgeous little quilt to my beautiful friend at her baby shower today! I was itching to show her pictures as I was making it - to make sure the colours would match the nursery - and from what I saw of other gifts she recieved, the colours match perfectly. Phew!!!

Here's how I went:

Fabric piles cut and ready to be laid out

Laid out and ready for sewing

Quilt top sewn together and looking so beautiful

Finished view of the top

Finished view of the bottom

Rolled and ready for wrapping

Wrapped and ready for giving xx