Ho Ho Ho in September

Happy belated Thanksgiving to everyone! We had a great day yesterday hosting Mike's family. The day had a rough start with dishes gone wrong, nose bleeds that wouldn't stop, lots to do and the kids doing their best to make everything twice as hard to get done, but once family arrived, it was a good time. Lots of food, drinks and laughs. Now it's on to Christmas!

I have to admit, I have been super antsy about the holiday and have had a really hard time holding off on the decorating and dressing the kids in their cute Christmas t-shirts. The boys love so much about the holiday that I'm ready to dive it. Watch out because there's going to be a serious amount of tree trimming and holiday spirit about to be unleashed at our house! Oh, and of course, the boys are wearing Christmas themed shirts today. 

Anyway, long ago (September) in a land far away (NH), we took a vacation. I have not exactly been on top of this blogging business lately and failed to finish blogging about our trip. Well now is actually the perfect time to post about our last big day on vacation because it was spent at Santa's Village!

Santa's Village is a year round kids amusement park in northern New Hampshire. We've opted for the "other" kid's park, Storyland, the last few years but decided to mix things up this year and see what Santa's Village was all about. It was seriously cute! Everything is Christmas themed of course. Given how much kids love Christmas, they thought it was great. Here's a run down of our day in pictures and captions.

We were greeted by Rudolph. If you said your name, he would greet you back personally.

Cupcake Chair!

The park had a great game. You picked up a card from "Elf School" and had to find all the lettered elves throughout the park. You punched your card on each one. Once you had a full card, you returned it and received your diploma. The boys loved it.

Dylan's favorite ride was the Humbug ride. You had to try and "tickle" the Humbugs with your laser to make them laugh.

Huge Nativity Scene
It felt a little weird to have Cade climbing all over the animals in a sacred scene but it seemed to be the thing to do.
When in Rome??

I was impressed with the little details that the park had.
Here are little male and female gingerbread cutouts in a railing.

Neither of the kids were too sure of Santa.
That should be interesting over the next few weeks when we plan to have some more run ins with the big guy.

We got to feed the reindeer!

Cade gave this one a little smooch.

We did a little shopping too.

I think the boys had the most fun of the day just chasing after each other in this little area.
It's really the little things for the kids, isn't it?

Despite the fun they were having at that point, they somehow were both giving the camera a pouty face at the same time.
We didn't really notice as I was taking the pictures, but Mike and I both laughed hysterically when we reviewed the pictures from the day and saw this. Those boys are too cute!

What's a Christmas themed park without a giant Easter Bunny?

Our Cute Little Gingerbread Men

And My Cute Little Man

While Cade had a nap in the stroller and Mike wheeled him around,
Dylan and I decorated (and ate) our own gingerbread men.

We ended our day by watching Dylan navigate the crazy, huge nutcracker slide just outside the entrance.

So there's our start to the holiday season back in September. Now it's time to get serious about it!

Crafting the Costume

Let's face it, even though I don't have a lot of time to do it, I enjoy tapping into my creative side.
When Dylan said he wanted to be a Skylander for Halloween, we did what any time strapped parent does, go straight to the web to shop. However, we only found 2 costumeand they both looked pretty stupid. I asked Dylan if he could chose any Skylander, who would he want to dress up as for Halloween. He fluctuated between Pop Fizz and Eye Brawl for a while but I finally got him to commit 100% to Eye Brawl. Given this is what I started with, I had lots of creative juices to make flow:

EyeBrawl!!

First step was figuring out the eye. It was pretty clear fairly early on that paper mache was the way to go. Somehow, I have made it this far in life without ever doing paper mache so I had to research the best ways to do it. Plus, time available and time until our Halloween parties gave me only 1 shot to get it right...no pressure or anything.

It was actually fairly difficult to get a base for the mache. The party stores didn't have round balloons that were big enough, beach balls are out of season and not to be found anywhere and I couldn't find an affordable globe to ruin for this purpose. Finally, Mike found the right size bouncy ball to use as our base. Having never paper mached before and not knowing too much about what kind of surfaces it might stick too, I was a bit nervous that in the end, that ball would not separate from the eye ball.

First and Second Layers
Cut Newspaper Strips, Flour\Water glue and careful placement to make neat pupil and neck openings.

3rd and Final Layer
Cut Paper Towel Strips, Elmer's Glue\Water Paste

After it was all dried, I added a couple of layers of white latex paint.

3 paper mache layers - 24 hours to dry in between each layer and then another day for paint application and drying. That was every night for an entire work week....most after the boys were in bed. Oh, and all the worry about the ball was for not. I did test to see that the edges seem to separate from the ball after each layer but I wasn't totally confident there wouldn't be an issue. After everything was dry, I took the scissors, popped a hole and the whole ball shriveled away without incident. 

For the pupil, I had about 4 layers of black gauze from the fabric store and blue duct tape cut and applied in small pieces to put them together, add some strength and give me a way to attach it to the paper mache eyeball. Small circles of adhesive Velcro did that trick. My theory was that Dylan could take off that part of the eyeball if it bothered him too much. In the end, the weight of it was what made him uncomfortable so the Velcro wasn't used. However, it worked to easily attach it so it wasn't all for not.

Not sure why the coloring looks so terrible in this picture but this is the gauze and duct tape pupil.

When looking for Eye Brawl costume trim, Velcro and gauze at the fabric store, I saw that they cut foam. I had planned on buying it and cutting myself but inquired further about their services. They said they could cut to square dimensions or, if given a template, cut to form. Score! I showed the woman the figure and she gave me some paper to cut the wings but then stopped me and said "There's a guy here who's an artist who could probably draw that very easily for you!" Double score! He decided to free hand so the two of them disappeared out back and reappeared about 10 minutes later with the perfect size, perfect shaped wings. I was super excited about how that worked out. All I did was spray paint a black base, tape off some spots and then add some silver on top. They looked awesome!

Painted Wings

I also then taped off and painted the front grill (underneath the front of the eye ball) and skull on the back.

Making the "Stencil" For The Skull

Back at the beginning of the process, when shopping for a beach ball, I came across some big Hulk hands at the store that were the perfect size for Eye Brawl hands. Unfortunately, they were green (of course). Fortunately, fabric paint exists. I've never used it much, but found a black spray paint bottle at the craft store and it applied very quickly and evenly over the hands. Only took 10 minutes of my time to spray 2 coats (with 24 hours of drying in between).

While on a walk the weekend before our Halloween party, I happened upon a garage sell where they were selling some old hockey pads - perfect for adding some bulk to make my little boy into a Skylanders. Sold!

Base Coat of Hulk Hands Painted
Trying on His Hockey Pads and Sweatshirt

It Fits!
Dylan's first modeling of head and hands.
I did add some more detail to the hands with my craft acrylic paint.

For all the trim, I used some parachute craft cord that I found at the craft store. I kind of ran out of time\energy so my grand plans to sew it on got demoted to a more timely glue gun application. It did need a little touch up after each event Dylan wore it too and possible wasn't too neat in places, but I'm sure I'm (mostly) the only one that noticed the flaws.

Last was the skull on the front. Cut cardboard, painted silver, with cut foam and stenciled spray paint made that. A couple of stitches applied it to the sweatshirt (as did the wings in the back).

EyeBrawl Top, Jammie Bottom

In the end, adding the trim to the sweatshirt took away some stretch and made it not at easy to get on and off. So, we ditched the hockey pads. They still made the costume though. I had cut off parts of it anyway and realized the padded sections were just the right size\shape\color of the detail on the lower back of EyeBrawl so they got hot glued on there.

To replicate the black boots, we found some solid black sneakers and some flashback to the 80s black leg warmers. Pretty sweet! And, of course, skinny black jeans for his pants.

The Back!

The Front

Dylan was so cute and excited to be involved in the process and help when he could. He didn't quite understand why it was taking so long to get finished, so it was a good lesson in the time and effort involved in crafting and creating. And, he looked totally awesome and happy in the end which made it all worth it. I won't lie though, it was fun at first but I was ready to be done with it before I actually was. Labor of love, labor of love.

Happy Hines Halloween

We have been waiting for this day for a long time now. Dylan LOVES anything spooky. Our lives have been nothing but talking about Halloween, watching Halloween shows and looking at Halloween decorations (around our house, at other people's yards and even at stores) for weeks now. I've also been doing a lot of work making Dylan's Halloween costume (which I'll talk more about another time). His current obsession is a Skylander's game and he wanted to be Eye Brawl. Not a costume mass produced of course which is why I had to take the reins.

This is Eye Brawl

Our Halloween celebration started a week and a half ago at a friends Halloween bash. The party was about half a mile away and parking was going to be tight so we opted to walk. We became our own little parade as we dressed in costume, loaded the kids up in the stroller, and walked over to their house. Imagine seeing this gang strolling down the street a couple of weeks before Halloween:

Skeleton, Lion, Jack Skeleton, Eye Brawl

Eye Brawl says, "I've got my EYE on you!"
Cade Lion says, "I'm not sure about this costume thing."

Dylan Eye Brawl with good pal Libby Strawberry Shortcake

Lion hugging on Strawberry Shortcake

Spooky Mama
I was worried I would scare Cade so I applied the makeup in front of him.
He wasn't phased in the least....he actually loved it and was very entertained
by made up mama all night. Dylan, of course, loves ALL skeletons...especially a Mom one.

The party was a great start to our Halloween festivities!

This week, Dylan came down with a nasty cold. Poor guy's been just feeling run down on the very week he's really been looking forward to. We decided to not have him go to school on Wednesday in lieu of taking it easy and getting back to better health. We did, however, scoot him up to school so he could participate in the school's Halloween parade. They basically walk up the street in costume, go into the bank, sing a couple of songs, walk back, sing the parents a song then go back in the school (or in Dylan's case go back home). The kids were all ridiculously cute and it was such a joy to go see.

Is it just me or does that eye ball really stand out in the crowd?

Then, of course, today was Halloween. I scooted out of work early to get home, get the kids (and me) dressed then went out for trick or treating. Cade was definitely not his usual happy self today (might be getting Dylan's cold) so he was not totally digging the whole trick or treat thing. What he did really like was picking candy out of buckets and putting them back in. Everything else, not so much.

Dylan was excited to go trick or treating with his best friend, Isabella. He was not so thrilled to wear the eyeball head I spent so much time making. He was a sport though and wore it at the doors for trick or treating and took it off in between.

Eye Brawl and Minnie Mouse

Right when the kids collectively decided they were done, we headed back to the house as some sprinkles started to fall so it was good timing.

We got home and enjoyed some candy. Cade was much happier once home, snuggling with mom and moving candy back and forth from bucket to bucket. And, we all took a turn trying on the eyeball head (which I thought was pretty comfortable to wear).

Giving Dylan's bucket his candy then stealing it back.

This should have been my costume...pretty sweet (naked baby included).

Naked Eye Ball Baby!!!

Both of the boys had a late bed time and were very ready to get to sleep. I'm somewhat concerned there's going to be some disappointed boys when the Halloween decor goes back into storage. Crossing my fingers were able to put it away without much drama as I'm ready to reclaim the house a bit....until the Christmas decor comes out at least.