2010 Halloween Party!

We had another successful party.

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

Next year is our 20th Halloween party anniversary.
Just YOU wait!
Happy Halloween!

Our {great} pumpkins!!!

Remember this pumpkin from our garden?

It's now this.

Chris did his marathon carving session Friday night with a little help from a four year old assistant.

Just wait until you see the rest of our 20+ pumpkins. They are fabulous!! My contribution this evening consisted of making roasted pumpkin seeds.

A few tips from Chris...aka Master Pumpkin Carver...

1. Carve your hole in the bottom. Martha was right after all.
2. Use a string of large white Christmas lights under the pumpkins when displaying them in the yard.
3. Save your hands and use rubber gloves when cleaning out the pumpkins.
4. The cheap pumpkin carving kits available in the grocery stores work really well, but put duck tape around the handles of the carving utensils for a better grip.

Hope you have a wonderful Halloween!
We're are soooo ready to get our party groove ON!!!
You ready for lots of party pictures???
Like you have a choice.
Just wait until you see Chris's costume.

Vintage Halloween Blog Party

I’m linking up to the Vintage Halloween Blog Party today at Anything Goes Here and I'm also giving a shout-out to one of my favorite crafting blogs... Life in Rehab.


To my regular followers, some of the pictures might look familiar, but I'm hoping for a few new guests.

Welcome EVERYONE!

I have a Christmas tree in my sunroom that is now a permanent fixture (much to the angst of my 12 year old). Each holiday it gets a make-over. Right now, it's sporting all sorts of fancy owls, old floral picks, and vintage paper cutouts that I've turned into ornaments with vintage bingo cards that I picked up from a favorite antique store.

A large die cut black cat sits on my sunroom shelf . She's a little worn, but she fits rather nicely with my black cat collection.

If I had a signature crafting piece, it would be my decorative vintage bingo cards. I love making them. This year, I took shredded tissue paper, vintage cutouts and cupcake picks to craft these bingo ornaments for my tree.

I picked up this casper board game for $2. I just love the graphics.


Every time I head to the Allegan Antique market I look for older items that I can repurpose for Halloween. These old dolls (including one storybook doll) were in very sad shape and so I decided to give them a little witchy makeover.

I managed to find this 1912 book at my favorite local antique store.

Check out a few of their Halloween games.

I'd love to own more vintage Halloween items. Cost usually gets in the way, but I'm always on the hunt at a few of my favorite mission thrift stores. If you scan through my blog, you'll see my house is FULL of all kinds of Halloween...this our favorite holiday of the entire year. Saturday is our 19th annual party. Our party turned kid-friendly after our daughter's adoption from China 2.5 years ago and we're looking forward to another full house of kiddos in their costumes Saturday night.

If you love vintage Halloween, be sure to check out Anything Goes Here. If you love crafting, be sure to also check out Life in Rehab. Her tutorials are easy peasy. Pinky swear.

Happy soon-to-be Halloween!
Get ready for lots of party pictures!