Halloween Pinterest Style

Owen Paul is currently obsessed with the game Angry Birds.

Enter this years Halloween theme, costumes, treats, and a few stitches for good measure.

Every year I love to make the boys costumes by hand. Usually this involves a needle and thread and many many hours, last year I borrowed my sister in laws sewing machine for the occasion (and didn't get it back to her until about 6 or 8 months later, oh boy.)  We have had a dinosaur, Elmo, Buzz Lightyear, and Babar the Elephant King in the past.

This year I was infinitely blessed with a sewing machine of my very own, thanks to a dear friend with a giving heart. I had forgotten how much a sewing machine adds to a project, the time involved in sewing is exponentially decreased (can you use exponential next to decreased because I can't think of a better way to describe it?). Not only did I have the benefit of a beautiful machine, I've also been introduced to the amazing world of Pinterest which is awesome. I can't believe I held out for so long.

There were many generic looking Angry Birds costumes that looked like giant circle pillows where the childs head poked through a peek-a-boo like hole. I knew that isn't what I wanted to do. Then I found this pinned delight, which was a great starting point for my costumes.

Source: coolmomtech.com via Teresa on Pinterest

But I needed to figure out how to get the shape exactly what I wanted so I kept looking and that's when I found the perfect tutorial. This blogger did an amazing job showing the details of how she made the Bomb Bird costume pictured below.

Source: aspottedpony.com via Teresa on Pinterest

I was able to figure out the basic shape and size thanks to her pictures and step by step. I knew that I wanted the fronts of my costumes to be 3d instead of 2 dimensional so I tweaked that and opted not to use Velcro.  And this is what we got!

I realized after getting Micah's costume made that I made his neckline WAY too big. So I sewed his straps at the base and they ended up serving perfectly as ears.  I only wish his costume had come down a little lower on him, but he had trouble standing and walking in it for long periods of time as it was because it was so heavy.

Ultimately, I love the way they turned out, I love the smiles and the fun the kids had in them trunk or treating at a church on Friday night and I'm looking forward to watching them answer the door all dressed up tonight when we pass out candy in an attempt to get to know our new neighbors.

Now that the costumes were completed I needed treats. Traditionally, I've done treats in the theme of their costumes, though I don't remember what we did last year, in years past I've done Dinosaur Marshmallow Monsters on Sticks and Elmo Cupcakes.  I scoured Pinterest for magnificent ideas and found a few, but didn't want to do cupcakes again. Then I found this owl.

Source: cookiesandcups.com via Teresa on Pinterest

 An owl is close to an angry bird, right? The shape was right, tweak the  decorations a little and I knew I had my inspiration.

In order to get 15 treats out of each color I had to make my krispie circles a little too thin for a sucker stick to work, so while I had them I opted to skip that step. Here are the darling treats I whipped up last night all bagged up and ready to go.

 Brian made a comment about how I could have made regular rice krispie treats then followed it up with "But that would go against every mommy instinct in your body wouldn't it?" Why, yes it would. This above and beyond nature that kicks in every Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Birthday, Easter, St. Patty's day, Valentines day etc, drives him absolutely crazy, but at the end of the night he came up to me, kissed my cheek and said "Thanks for being super mom, it makes me proud of you."

And that, my friends, is one of the three reasons I do it. The other two are at Daycare enjoying a Halloween party knowing that mommy loves them.

I hope you have a safe and fun filled evening.