10 Last Minute Halloween Costumes

Every year, Halloween sneaks up on me.  I start planning my costumes and decorations, my crafts and my projects months in advance...and still, I'm surprised to look up and find Halloween staring me SMACK in the face.  This month has been particularly crazy for me as I had so much on my plate.  So last night when I look at the calendar and find our Trunk or Treat activity is tonight, I went into full panic mode.

Since we are down to only one car, that means I never go anywhere anymore.  It's a little frustrating sometimes, but it is what it is.  So as I talked with Mini Me and Daredevil about Halloween costumes at 8:30 last night, we had to get super creative.

Daredevil decided he wanted to go as a football player, which worked out perfectly since this was his first year playing tackle football and and playoffs aren't until Saturday.  We lucked out and had all the gear, he just would have to suit up and go.  Mini Me was a little more difficult.

We ended up raiding the garage for boxes and made him a Wii Remote costume.  He was so excited to be able to pick the colors and spray paint the box any color he wanted.  So while it may not have been my choice in design, I'm learning to let go and let him have his fun.

But while we were scouring the garage for costume ideas, I kept telling myself that surely I'm not the only one in this boat.  (And then I told myself to stop calling me Shirley...*tell me someone caught the "Airplane" reference.)  You see how things sneak up on me so?  I get so easily distracted.  

So here are 10 last minute Halloween costume ideas using things you might already have around the house.

1. Rubik's Cube Costume from Coolest Homemade Costumes

2. Fork in the Road Costume from Real Simple

3. Pinterest Board from Parties for Pennies

4. Stick Figure Costume from Creatively Christine

5. Lego Costume from Country Living

6. John Deere Farmer from Geek Mom

7. Old Time Black and White Costume from Unknown.

8. Facebook Costume from Trevor & Lesley

(We made this one for Daredevil last year when we were living in the hotel.  He was the HIT of the Party!)

9. Price is Right Costume from B Side Blog

10. Abercrombie Ad Costume from Unknown

Can you tell I love fast, easy, multi-use boxes for my costumes?  I wish I could find a picture of it, but one year, we wrapped a huge box in Christmas paper and Mini Me went as a Christmas Present.  Another year, the Perfectionist went as a Kissing Booth.  Boxes are a quick, creative last minute Halloween costume!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

With October in full swing, and life getting ABSOLUTELY crazy as I prepare for birthdays, a HUGE family reunion, and the start of the holiday crafting season....I've decided to take some time out and bake.

Yea, it's something I find I don't do too much now that I'm a working mama.  Dear Hubby and Mini Me were complaining about the lack of Cookie Fridays, so I decided to pamper all of us and make some Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies.

These cookies make me Mom of the Year.

Partly because they are that good,

partly because like Drama Queen said "I remember these from long ago", I just don't make them that often.

I don't know why. 

They are super easy...

Mix 1 cup of Pumpkin

1 cup Sugar

1/2 cup Oil

1 Egg

In a seperate bowl, mix 2 cups of Flour

2 teaspoons of Baking Powder

1 teaspoon Cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon of Salt

Combine the wet and dry ingredients.

Mix until well blended.

Add 1 teaspoon Milk

1 teaspoon Baking Soda

and 1 teaspoon Vanilla

and mix.

Add 1 (or 2 or 3) cups of semi-sweet chocolate chips.

Drop mounds of cookie dough onto a baking sheet.

These cookies don't spread much, so it's okay if they get a little close and personal.

Cook at 375 degrees for 10 to 14 minutes.

Now you too can be Mom of the Year!

Pumpkin Pie Spice Recipe

If you are like me at all, part of the great appeal of fall is baking.  Yes, I absolutely love the crisp fall air, football, the changing leaves, but I love to bake pumpkin pie, pumpkin bread, pumpkin cookies....are you catching the theme here?

But the worst part of baking with pumpkin is the cost of those itty, bitty spice jars of Pumpkin Pie Spice.  I mean, REALLY?  Just one little jar for a loaf of pumpkin bread is almost $4.00!  Is that crazy or what?

Finally, I got smart and decided to find a way to make my own.

So I did some Pinterest surfing and stumbled across Table for Two's Pumpkin Pie Spice Recipe.

You can thank me later.

Expecially since I'll be sharing LOTS of yummy pumpkin recipes in the next few days.

Halloween Candy Corn Bark

Today is the kind of day when you need LOTS of chocolate.  It started out well, but has gone downhill since.  So when I saw this Candy Corn Bark from Kristan at Confessions of a Cookbook Queen, I had to make some STAT! (Yea, did you catch that medical jargon?  You can tell "Grey's Anatomy" is back right?)

Her recipe was really simple and it turned out super cute.  Although, I admit, I wasn't near as good as Kristan was in swirling my orange and yellow, but it works.  And for the day I'm having, I'm glad something is at least!

To finish it off, I designed up this Happy Halloween tag with a Candy Corn font.  It's generic enough that you can use it for any Halloween treat you give this month, but still super fun.

Hope it brightens your day a little!

Spider Window Decoration

Here's another easy spider decoration for your Halloween party with alot of fun pizazz.

I started with some black electrical tape and these 3-D spider window stickers.  I found both at Dollar Tree.  The stickers were over in the Halloween section back behind a bunch of Vampire stickers.  I had to really dig to find them.  The electrical tape was in the hardware section.  (Just so you know...I HATE when I go to a store to find something I've seen blogged about and can't find it.  I end up wandering around the store for hours trying to pin point it.  So I do my best to try and help you not to waste precious crafting time searching.)

Since the electrical tape is on black on both sides, it doesn't matter if you make your spiderweb on the inside of the outside of the window.  But start with a sunshine half circle.  It's your decision on how big to make it.

Next, string the electrical tape into "rays" coming out from your sunburst.  Finish it off by string the tape between the rays.  The electrical tape is pretty easy to turn and is very forgiving if you don't like how it looks.

The spiders are sticky only on the bottom, but are pretty cool looking from both sides.  Finish off your spiderweb by placing the spiders in random spots around the web.

It's starting to look a little like a spider infestation around here.  I admit, I love it.  I'm not sure Dear Hubby will come visit me anytime soon, but it's still pretty fun to look around at all the fun props.

Easy Spider Ceiling Decoration

It's finally October!  I'm so excited.  I have so many things going on this month that I have been itching to get started on the month.  Now that it's finally here, I'm a little overwhelmed as I look at all that needs to be done.

So I'm starting out with a super simple ceiling decoration that is quite the eye catcher!

I started with a roll of crepe paper from Dollar Tree, a pack of black balloons from a local grocery store, and a bit of packing tape.

I started in the center of the room and made 8 legs going out to the edge of the room.  I didn't go all the way to the wall, but about a foot or two from it.  There I taped the crepe paper and let another foot dangle down.

Using two balloons, I made the spider's body.  One balloon, I blew up as large as it would go for the spider's body.  The second balloon I blew into a circle for the spider's head.  Then I put a bunch of packing tape to the underside and positioned them in the center of the room on the meeting point of all the spiders legs.

Now I have a huge but relatively friendly spider in the center of the room.  

I'm not sure you can tell from the pictures, but it's super cool and really is an eye catching piece!