kattitudes

I absolutely love these. The entire series is so adorable. And the details! The pumpkin has a cat balloon. And the cat has a pumpkin balloon. And did you see the witch stockings on both of them? Oh man. I just love these.

Make them make them make them. These three are worth the effort.

These are so quick and easy, it should be illegal.

I love that zippers were used for the mouths. Now that is a great use for old broken zippers. I can actually put to use scrap zippers that are trash in the scrap bag.

And just a few scraps for nose and eyes and highlights. Lots of stuffing and a quick seam to shut it all up together and you are done.

There. A quick project that gives a lot of personality to the house. Whip some out and take one over to a friend as a surprise. Just as a “thought you could use a little spook of the season” surprise.

There is still plenty of time to get this stuff made, if you have your needle and thread handy. This would require a bit of time spent with your scissors and some felt, but once that was done, you would have a fantastic little tablecloth that would knock your socks off.

There is no way I would be up for making this in a large size, but as a centerpiece on the table - very cute.

Click on the pillow to see the details. This is too wonderful to miss the little bits.

This beauty uses not only the drill for decoration, but also the drill for creating enough holes to anchor two strands of Christmas (or fairy) lights. Plugged in, they adequately light up the entire pumpkin from inside and out, creating an horrific light show.

White was used here as per normal, but since it’s for Halloween, I still want to use a strand of black lights or purple or even green just to cast an eerie light over the evening’s festivities.

Power tools and pumpkins. My new alliterative friends. How did Halloween ever get along without you?

I saw this while reading up on a website about diabetic issues. Apparently he got tired of carving too. Gotta say I can appreciate his feelings.

Click on the photo to see the pillow full size. The detail work is too wonderful to miss it in the smaller size.

Does this happen in your neighborhood? Or is this just a southern phenomenon?

My Mister is in complete disagreement with me, but I have turned into an absolute curmudgeon over this. I find it rude.

On Halloween, since purchasing our house, we have teenagers - old teenagers (some pushing 20!) - show up at our door, no costume, nothing. Just ring the doorbell and stand there staring at us when we open the door.

The first year, two “boys” were in their early twenties! I was aghast!

80% of the time, they won’t even deign to say “trick or treat”. They just stand there looking at you as if you are supposed to magically know that you are to hand them candy because they are standing at your door on Halloween night.

I. am. sorry.

If you come to my door on Halloween night, wear a costume.

If you come to my door on Halloween night expecting candy, wear a costume.

If you come to my door on Halloween night expecting candy, you need to take the time out of your busy schedule to utter that magic phrase that communicates that desire by saying out loud to me, “Trick or Treat”.

If you come to my door on Halloween night, over the age of 14, in street clothes standing there mute and staring at me petulantly in expectation, you had damn well better hope my Mister opens the door, because if it is me there - this year, I’m closing the door.

Learn some manners.

If you are on my doorstep, asking for something from me for free, you damn well better be asking politely.

Learn some damn manners or get off my doorstep.

We love Halloween around here. I even go out of my way to buy regular sized candy bars. Not the fun sized, or even the rip off miniature sized candy bars. No way. I buy regular sized candy bars. I like being the house with good candy on Halloween.

But I expect common decency and I will not tolerate an attitude of entitlement. What you are entitled to is getting off my doorstep and taking your attitude with you.

Me handing you a candy bar on Halloween is simply not one of your constitutionally guaranteed rights. So, if you suddenly find yourself on the other side of my closed door this year, well … stand there for a minute and my Mister will probably run down and rescue you. Because I sure as hell am not going to tolerate this kind of rudeness any longer.

Phew. OK, I think my vent is over.

This just really pushes my buttons, can you tell?

The little kids that come to the door are so precious and so gracious too. They are so excited about their costumes and each one of them has always wanted to tell you exactly what they are and squeal in delight when they see that candy bar go into their bags. And the little kids in costume always always chant in unison a combined Thank You as they run to the next door. So adorable!

The big kids without costumes are surly, as if they know that they are pushing their luck. And you know, if they were being silly and getting into the spirit of things - wearing a costume and joining in on the fun, I don’t think anyone would begrudge them the fun of the moment. I certainly wouldn’t. Heck, we still dress up and have our annual party. We make our guests dress up and attend in the wildest costumes imaginable. We get into the spirit of the holiday. We answer the door on Halloween night in costume, no less.

It is the no costume, no comments, no speaking, just- hand- me- the- free- candy- you- bought- with- your- hard- earned- money- and- I’ll- walk- away- with- no- acknowledgment that I am completely over.

So, this year, I’m making a new rule.

No costume. No candy.

I wish I could remember where I found this because frankly, it is nasty as hell. Yeah. Can you tell I’m not a spider person?

This is constructed of PVC pipes and PVC joints. If you look closely, you can see where the PVC joints are sunk into the ground under the pumpkins too, so it creates a small tableau for the two pumpkins to sit on. Then, while you cannot see it in this picture, the smaller pumpkin is carved with 8 eyes, so at night it lights up with a candle and (shudder shudder) looks like a spider.

Oh my goodness. I just gave myself the chills. Maybe only people with spider phobias would find this a perfect Halloween decoration, but I have to tell you - looking at it during the day … not so icky. Night time? EEW!

So I have been posting all these neat labels and clip art with the idea that we can make our own items with them, instead of paying the exorbitant prices being asked in the retail market these days. The idea was for you to take the clip art and work with it in your graphics program and then print it using your printer.

Cost savings item number one. Halloween treat buckets:

And these I really love. These are just mint type tins with the labels put on them. They can be filled with candy and used to pass out as a very special Halloween treat.

What a wonderful use of this clip art! And by making it ourselves, we have only the cost of supplies, plus we get the thrill of creating another neat piece.