Alisha's Little Corner of the World

I have not been doing well at blogging this year, at all. You may have noticed. I never seem to have time for anything these days, and Paxton usually monopolizes the computer for watching movies (I know, Mother of the Year over here) so that also hinders my blogging ability. However, yesterday was a day of such awesomeness that I absolutely, positively must let the world know about the goings on. It was "Halloween Pinterest Craft Day 2012!!!" Cristy and I decided that we didn't want to be "those women" who just pin everything and then never try any of the things we were pinning (mostly because our husbands would make fun of us). So Halloween Pinterest Craft Day was born. We picked out 3 different crafts and informed Jackie that she needed to come do crafts with us as well, even though she's not on Pinterest ...yet (insert evil laugh here).

We were a little afraid that we were going to end up here but we ended up with success! I got all of the materials for about $20 each (we figured it was just easier for 1 of us to buy the materials for everyone so that we all had the same stuff) and much fun was had by all. We all met up at my house bright and early at like 9 am, geared up for a fantastic day of crafting (except for Cristy who was feeling ill but still came and then the magic of crafting made her feel less like death as the day went on).

First up "Smelly Feet Plate" Here's what it looked like on Pinterest:

I know, right? The caption said "too stinkin' cute" and it really is.

Supplies:

ceramic plate
Sharpie pen
white paint
paint brush
oven

I had to go to 3 different dollar stores to find orange ceramic plates because the first 2 only had plastic colored plates and we needed to put them in the oven ... and as we all know, ovens and plastic don't really get along too well. We all got our boys' footprints on the plates ahead of time since they were not attending Pinterest Craft Day (took me 4 tries and a new Hot Wheels car to get Paxton's footprints. Good thing the paint just washes off the plate when it's wet!). We also decided that we were maybe not crafty enough to paint the words on so we used a sharpie instead (according to another Pin if you write on the ceramic plate with a Sharpie and then bake it at 150 F for 30 minutes it makes the ink permanent ... not that these plates will likely be eaten off of in the future, but we weren't taking any chances). But I also was not smart and we only had 1 Sharpie to share between the 3 of us so it took a bit longer than it should have. And also, a big "Thank You" to my Mom ... apparently after observing all your "fancy" writing during my teenage years, I was able to produce a specimen worth copying :)

Here's what we ended up with (good thing I washed my stove off before this event happened!)

Next up "Spider Web Frame":

This one was more difficult than the feet plates. It is also worth noting that of the 3 of us girls, I am the only one who does not own a glue gun ... I'm not entirely sure how that works since I'm the one that grew up in Raymond, but it's a fun fact. I think I need to invest in one before "Christmas Pinterest Craft Day 2012" comes around though. Anyway, the blog for this craft had instructions on how to create this masterpiece which was good since I don't think we would have figured it out on our own just from looking at the picture. (It also shows you how to make a giant one on your wall if you so desire.)

Supplies:

picture frame
yarn
glue gun (or tape)
stop watch (if you have super impatient friends like me)

This really is pretty easy and despite us having an argument about whose spider web was the worst (ya we all thought that ours was the winner of that particular competition even though they all looked pretty good). Apparently I am also the "Slowest Web-Weaver in the West" since it took me way longer than Jackie and Cristy to complete my masterpiece ... a fact that they were more than happy to point out to me ... repeatedly. There were way more pictures from this one because some people had nothing to do but harass me about my slowness :)

It started off just fine with us all at the same place ...

Jackie and Cristy pouting because I was taking so long (note that I had to stop my web-weaving so that I could take this picture for them. ahem)

Cristy wishing she had a watch so she could tell me how long I was taking

Jackie sleeping (and drooling) on the table because I was taking so long

Jackie (awake from her nap) and telling me how long I was taking

Ta-da! All done!

Last but not least, we tackled "Dryer Hose Pumpkins"

This one we had to figure out on our own from the picture since the blog attached to the picture had been removed.

Supplies:

"Metal" dryer hose
Spray Paint
Glue Gun
"Stem"
"Moss"

A Big thank you to my friend, Colin, owner of "Blooms flowers and gifts" for helping me find the "moss" and also to Jackie's tree for losing some branches in the big wind a few weeks back so we could have "stems" and also to Jackie's husband, Craig, for cutting up the branches for us :)

So the night before, I realized at about 7 pm that I should probably spray paint the dryer hoses so that they would be dry in time for us to use them the next day. Let me tell you, spray-painting dryer hoses during twilight while trying to keep your 2 dogs and almost-3-year-old away so that they don't get loopy off the fumes/touch the wet paint is an adventure. My house also smelled pretty awesome yesterday morning. Anyway, we started off by cutting the hoses. (Make sure you have some wire cutters handy if you're attempting this one, 'cuz scissors just don't cut it ... no pun intended)

Next we glue-gunned the ends together, inserted the stems and then glue-gunned some moss around the stems. (as you can see in the Pinterest photo, you can make them into "pumpkin" shape first and then spray paint them, but in the interest of time we did them differently.)

And voila! A pumpkin patch:

We didn't get a picture of all our spider webs together before, so they're in the background.

Easy-peasy lemon-squeezy! And since our crafts didn't take nearly as long as we had anticipated, we decided that Cristy and Jackie needed some foam bats, ghosts and spiders just like the ones I made last year.

And some moustaches ... lol.

We're super proud of our craftiness and started planning what we're going to do for "Christmas Pinterest Craft Day 2012" already!

We had the fabulous Rhonda Steed do our Robinson Family Pictures again. We absolutely LOVE Rhonda! She takes great pictures and never fails to capture the candid moments for us. This year was more challenging than those we've done in the past since we had 3 year old Brock and 2 1/2 year old Paxton and they were ever so cooperative ... not! In retrospect, I should have taken the day off work so the boys could have played BEFORE we started doing pictures, but we worked with it. We decided to do them in Lethbridge this year since we've done "field" pictures in Raymond the last 2 times. And it also worked out better for the kids since Jay and I both had to work and Cliff had to drive back to Sylvan right after we finished. So we vetoed Grandpa's idea to do them in Cardston and did some in an alley downtown and some at the Galt. Without further ado, here's the Robinson clan:

Paxton had to have Batman and Bedtime Bear for the first part of pictures.

I suppose they're sort of like family ...

Paxton and Brock did NOT want to sit still for this picture, so Rhonda got them to throw rocks at her to keep them happy ... little did she know that they have pretty decent aim for their age!

Brock also did not want to sit by his Mom at all. Rhonda kept telling him to come sit in front of me because "Auntie is so embarrassed that she wore those red shoes. You should sit in front of her to cover them up." Too funny!