It must be easy if I can do it!

I've been a bad blogger lately.  I'm still sewing, but seem to have lost my mojo for taking pictures.  Hopefully I can start to catch up.  It also doesn't help that every blogging app for my iPad crashes and burns.  Has anyone found a good blogging app for iPad?  Does such a thing exist yet?


So I've been in the mood to knit or crochet.  I'm an extreme beginner and have only made scarves and one headband.  When  I purchased a few easy patterns on etsy which claimed to be for beginners, I was frustrated that they seemed difficult to understand.  I even turned to my handy Knitting/Crocheting references, but no, still too confusing.  For instance, when crocheting a hat, at the beginning you are instructed to make a chain of only two stitches and then make multiple stitches into each of these two original stitches.  When I tried that it turned into a huge ugly knot!  So I turned to Ravelry.  I found this great pattern , which is actually suited for a beginner.  It turned out to be right at my level.  It was my first time using stitch markers and my first time seaming pieces together.  My daughter, Maura loves them!  

And since I am so far behind in posting projects,

 it's probably now or never to show you our Halloween photos:

Ms. Maura as Jesse from Team Rocket.

I made her top using Jalie Pattern 2453, I just changed the shape and shortened it.  I also cut the sleeves a bit larger to get a puffed sleeve look.  I made her Pokeball candy bag so people would have a hint that she's a character from Pokemon.  (I love it that she is almost 15 and is still into Pokemon, she's hanging onto that childhood!)

And I am sure these guys need no introduction:

James and Travis as the Mario Brothers

The only thing I made here was the Power Up treat bag, which was fine since sewing Halloween costumes isn't my favorite kind of project.

and last but not least, Liam the old-time gangster:

We are off to Disney soon, but I hope to get some projects done before then.  I'm very slowly drafting an Octoberfest dress for myself (I know it's November).  I had visions of wearing it in the beer garden at Epcot Germany.
Maybe it will be done before next October?

more Halloween fun

This past weekend Maura attended the Teen Halloween Party at our town library.  We made these Cauldron Cupcakes from Meg at MegaCrafty.  These taste as good as they look!!  Mine aren't as neat as hers, but everyone sure did like them.

We also made a Halloween "Tree".  I got the idea from martha stewart Living a few years ago.  First I spray painted some branches black, put them in a vase, then added some 'ornaments'.  This looks great on our kitchen counter!

 The bats, cat, and 3-D pumpkins were all cut on my Silhouette machine.  The Raven and Owl images I got from the Graphics Fairy, I made two copies of each, then glued them back to back with some cardstock and hanging ribbon in between.

The skeletons are from the dollar store.  I went there looking for mini skeletons and there they were!  Amazing.



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And now I'm off to try to get some sewing done before this guy gets up:

We've been BOOED...

A few nights ago we opened our front door and found this mysterious package.  It was full of halloween candy, so the kids were thrilled!  We read the note and found out it was our job to keep the "BOO" going by secretly distributing treat bags to two more families.  How cool is that?

Here's what we came up with:

We made these homemade goodies to throw in with the store-bought candy.  It's Candy Corn Cookie Bark.  I got the recipe here.  It looks pretty impressive with all those colors, and after a, ahem, taste test I thought it was actually very good!

 
The papercutting was all done on my Silhouette machine.  We also made these little coffins to put candy corn in:

The kids had a rush trying to drop off these treat buckets without being noticed!  When they came back to the car their hearts were pounding!  Maura got busted, because for some reason her friend was sitting in the car eating applesauce and saw the whole thing!!  Liam had a successful mission, his friend was playing on the trampolene and didn't see a thing.  That was our excitement for the day!