Life goes on. This past Monday or Tuesday, I don't remember which, I realized that the coming Friday would be Halloween. How was I going to deal with that? Right after Dad's funeral?
I knew that I would have to some how. It's what dad would want.
The kids have been pestering me to carve pumpkins. The ones we grew were very small and would be very hard to carve. So yesterday with the company of j and my younger brother, Ben, we headed out to Wally World to get some Halloween candy for mom and some pumpkins for our family and a black cat costume for j.
The pumpkins were only $2 a piece! I bet they are down to $1 today and they still had nice ones left. Last night after dinner we gutted the pumpkins. Well j and I did. M and G tried to help but got too grossed out and J wanted nothing to do with that part of the fun.
I love those pumpkin carving kits that you can buy now. Back in my day we carved old school with paring knifes and steak knives. Now they have those great little saws and patterns. We bought one probably four or five years ago and are still using the same one this year. Next year I'll probably break down and buy a new one.
Here are the pictures of our fun filled night. We only did two pumpkins. The kids took turns carving and I think that they did a great job. I only helped j a little bit, she did most of her parts herself.
*warning* If pumpkin guts make you squeamish you may want to skip the first three photos or scroll by them really fast.
Halloween is on it's way. And if your house is anything like our house the kids talk about what they want to be for Halloween all year long. We have to put a moratorium on speaking of Halloween costumes or it would be a nightly discussion at the dinner table. In fact, they start talking about what they want to be next year for Halloween on November 1st. It's crazy.
On my older blog one of the highest ways people found me was through a Google search for Larry Boy Costume. My oldest son had an affinity for Larry Boy (that is a nice and mild way to put it). He wanted a LB costume but there were none to be found. This was back in 2002 most people did not know who Larry Boy was. If you are unfamiliar with Larry Boy now and are wondering what gibberish I am going on about here is a video...please for you to enjoy.
Me? I can't sew anything but a straight line so a fabric costume was out of the question. Plus how do you sew plungers? If you are thinking "What in the world is she talking about? PLUNGERS?" and did not watch above video I refer you to said video so you will understand.
Me? I'm good with things like poster board and colored foam and duct tape. So that's what his costume is made of. Oh and I bought two regular sized plunger bottoms from the store because they were out of the small ones. And actually the larger ones were better for the scale of the costume but they were incredibly hard to keep in place and they made the whole thing very top heavy.
I'm posting the pictures of my son in his LB costume so as to help out any of those mothers out there searching in desperation for one. To give them inspiration or maybe just a good laugh. Just out of curiosity I Googled to see if there are any LB costumes out there for sale. I didn't really see anything that was in the retail world. Other mothers just as desperate and far more talented than I have come up with some good ideas. But I'd thought I'd put my own out there as well.
I also thought I'd put pictures up of the kids in some of my more favorite costumes to get the creative juices flowing. Here they are.
We painted his face. Like I said the rest of it is made of poaster board and that craft foam and of course my beloved duct tape. When we went out that night trick or treating most people had no idea what J was supposed to be. A few, though, did know and recognized him as Larry Boy on the spot.
This next pic is M as a cow girl. It's done with brown paper bags and white paint. The belt buckle is just cardboard covered in tinfoil. You could probably use white paper and just tape it on on instead of painting it. Why I didn't think of that at the time I don't know.
This is j as a Jelly Fish. It's a piece of foam board covered with batting and a lovely pink material that is stapled to the foam board. As are the strips of crepe paper. I used a regular stapler but it would have been much simpler and more sturdy with a heavy duty stapler. Oh and the foam board has to have a hole cut in the middle for the head to fit in and a strap to attach it under the chin or maybe under the shoulders. I have a couple more that are favorites but it looks like the pictures of them aren't on my computer so I'll have to find them and scan them in. Hmmm.... I wonder if I'll actually get around to it.
BTW my kids still don't know for sure what they want to be for Halloween. The whims change daily but I need to get them going on getting their minds made up. Only, what, 36 more days until All Hallows Eve.
