Happy Halloween!

I decided that I would try again to muster up some Halloween spirit by painting a fun, festive image on our front window.  Last year's window introduced the world to the addition of our 3 new family members and I thought it was fun, so I decided to keep up the tradition by painting our 6 cats out playing in the pumpkin patch.  No people got represented this year, but let's face it, our lives are all about the cats anyway, so this is still pretty accurate :).

We also have a big family Halloween party that we host each year with soup, games, pumpkin carving, etc. and this the piñata that I made for the kids.  It was a pretty fast DIY project.  Al you need is a shoebox, an empty toilet paper roll, some colored paper and a black marker.  The kids loved it!

I feel like I should get some bonus decorating points for how amazing the fall colors in our back yard were during the party.

And... last, but not least, here is a little holiday update on the whole minion hat thing....

Riley, the kid who started it all dressed as a minion with his teacher dressed as Gru.

Me and Riley dressed as minions, with Kristin supporting the Day of the Dead.  Oddly enough, that was her required costume for work on Halloween and the face paint was done by a co-worker, so she didn't get to wear her minion hat.

Kristin's work goes all out for Halloween and each department decorates to a theme.  The décor in their area was pretty awesome!

I even helped by making the flags that hang above the alter.



If you look close you'll see that the yellow flags have skulls, the red flags say "DEAD" and the blue flags have pumpkins cut out.  It's kind of hard to see the blue with the black background, but the overall effect works.



Now... back to the minions :).

My cute niece and nephew, who occasionally play the role of my minions in real life :).

More Minions



I got four more minion hats made.  Two are for me and Kristin and the other two are my work friend Joanne and her husband.  I learned a few things after round one and was ale to make some improvements here.  The size has been adjusted so that these fit adult heads better and the center of the eyes is a little smaller and cleaner than the original version.  I also learned that an eye size adjustment is needed if you are making a minion with one eye vs. two.

I made the executive decision that there needed to be a girl minion for Joanne.  I think the pig tails turned out cute.

I also like the hair on this one better than on the first.  It is the same style, but by tying each piece off on the inside before adding the next I was able to add a little height to each strand of hair so it's not laying flat against the hat.  Much better!

Here is the top view of all the hair

And the finishing touch of a personalized label inside each one.

These hats have been approved my minions everywhere!

Minion Hat

Is handiwork art?  I'm declaring it so and adding my latest project to this blog.

Like a ton of kids right now, my 10 year old nephew is really into Despicable Me.  I decided to put my crocheting skills to the test and attempted to surprise him by making him a Minion hat.



I think the final result turned out pretty cute.

The hat started out as a one-eyed minion, and although Riley LOVED it, I thought it needed something else.



Silly kid

It was much better after adding a mouth and some blue trim around the bottom, but Riley decided that he wanted one with two eyes.  That worked out well for me because from the beginning I thought the eye was a little too big and considered replacing it.

Ta da!  The finished product.  The two smaller eyes were perfect and Riley loves his new hat.

From this top angle you can see the hair as well as the addition of the goggles in 3-D.

I've already had more requests for hats from some family and friends, so I'm working on a few more.  Stay tuned :).