Spooky Halloween Dinner Ideas

My kids love Halloween and insisted that we have a spooky dinner to celebrate the wonderful holiday.  I wanted a creepy, fun dinner, but also food that they would actually eat, and as always- simple and easy.  So here is what we came up with, which was a big hit and devoured quickly!

Bloody Brains and Fingers

Can't get much easier than spaghetti!  I added a little sign that said bloody brains and my kids were pleasantly grossed out enough.  :)  We added almonds to our bread sticks to make them look like fingers.

Best Punch- Hands Down :)

Everyone loved the punch with the floating hand.  :)  I just put water in a latex (non-powdered) glove and froze it.  I got the idea from an old roommate who was the queen of Halloween.  She used to make a bloody hand drink each year.  She would add cranberry juice and mixed berries in the water before she froze it in the glove to make it look bloody.  Her frozen bloody hand looked way better than my plain hand, but it served it's purpose just fine.  :)

Mud with Worms

Instead of using chocolate pudding (that my kids don't care for) I used chocolate ice cream and put a layer of crushed oreos in the middle of the ice cream and then on top with a few worms.  It was delicious!  The kids loved this as well as the adults.

Hope your Halloween is filled with lots of spooky, scrumptious treats!!

DIY Homemade Lightsaber

October- a time for pumpkins, candy, caramel apples, and your kid changing his mind a billion times about what he will be for Halloween.  At least that is what happened in my house.  :)  The week of Halloween, my son finally decided that he was going to be Darth Vader for Halloween.  He already had the mask and cape, so that made things easy.  The only thing he was missing was a red lightsaber.  I almost just bought one, but all of the cheaper lightsabers I found had terrible reviews.  And these homemade lightsabers are still our favorite for lightsaber battles and playtime, so there was no need for spending a lot of money.  So I began to think about how I could make a red lightsaber.  Maybe red duct tape, red siran wrap?  I went to walmart and they didn't have either of those two things.  Then I wandered over to the Christmas section hoping I would find something red that would inspire me.  Something indeed caught my eye.  Red shiny foil wrapping paper.  It was perfect.  This $1.25 wrapping paper would make a perfect lightsaber.  The shininess of the foil paper was perfect for the illumination of a lightsaber.  I probably could have just used the whole roll of wrapping paper itself, but I didn't want to waste the paper (I could use it in 2 months for Christmas!) and I thought the roll might get a little smashed in my son's hand all night.  So I grabbed some pvc pipe I had in my garage from an old shelf.  I taped 2 pipes together and then rolled the wrapping paper around it and sealed it with glue.  Took less than 5 minutes.  Talk about cheap and easy!   

For the handle I used silver and black duct tape and drew some buttons on with permanent markers.

This $1 (and change) homemade lightsaber was the perfect accessory for my son's Halloween costume and looked great in all our pictures!

He has already put in a request for a green lightsaber next. :)

Homemade Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Costumes

My son's latest obsession- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.  I remember dressing up as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles when I was little!  Perhaps that's part of the reason (and the fact that I'm cheap!) that I just couldn't bring myself to paying so much for the expensive turtle costumes and accessories in stores.  So here are some cheap and easy ideas of how to help your child transform into a ninja turtle!

Leonardo- blue bandana and 1 noodle cut in half.  Leonardo's actual weapons are knifey sword things... I think's that's the actual name.  :)  Ok, maybe they're actually known as twin katanas. I found foam swords at target in their dollar section that looked good, however, as my 5 year old even observed- the foam swords break easily and aren't as good for actual playing.  So we like the noodles since they hold up well as we've learned from past experience.

Rafael- red bandana and twin sai (forkey things).  For Rafael's weapon, I just cut the fork shape out of a card board box and then wrapped it with silver duct tape on top and black duct tape on the bottom.  I used 2 pieces of cardboard in each one to make it more sturdy.

(Here's a picture of the sai before I added the black duct tape)

Michelangelo- orange bandana and nunchucks.  I got lucky and found these nunchucks at the dollar store.  Before finding these dollar nunchucks, we used baby linking rings for our nunchucks.  (You can spot them in my daughter's belt in the pictures below).

Donatello- purple bandana and bo staff (noodle with black duct tape).

Turtle shirts- I found the turtle shirts at kohls for about $6 each.  (Target also had similar shirts).  You could also get plain green t-shirts if you're looking for something a little cheaper.

In my browsing, I did see several turtle masks (ranging from cheap paper ones for a few dollars to plastic masks for $10) but I passed on them and went with bandanas instead.  Not only were the bandanas cheaper and reusable, but they are far more comfortable for kids to wear and play in.

3 Happy Turtles :)

I was tempted with my son's birthday around the corner to purchase the $15 TMNT shell I saw at several stores.  But that didn't even come with a weapon and would cost another $10-20 for that. So instead I grabbed a free cardboard box from my garage and started with that.  :)

I turned the box inside out and used an x-acto knife to cut slits into the back so I could pull a ribbon through for arms straps and then knotted the ribbon on the inside.  (Wears like a backpack).  My son's favorite turtle is Leonardo, so we cut 2 circles in the top so he could store his weapons in his shell.  (This was one of his favorite parts.  I also thought of putting a belt through the shell to hold the weapon, but my son loved the idea of having slots in the shell for his weapon).  Then I taped the box shut.  And my son drew lines on the box to make it look like a shell.

  

Not quite as flashy as a TMNT shell you can purchase at the store, but for my 5 year old, he thinks it's the coolest thing ever.  And the next day, he wanted to make another one for his sister so she could be a turtle too.  :)

I recently heard the quote- "If you want your children to turn out well, spend twice as much time with them and half as much money."  I could definitely see how spending time together on this project was far more valuable than if I had just purchased the toy from the store.  My son and I had a blast making his turtle shell.  I loved hearing his creative input as we constructed it, intermixed with stories about him and his friends playing turtles at recess.  It was a fun project to do together, not to mention it saved me at least 20 bucks that I can put towards the next thing he's obsessed with.  :)  

Click here for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Birthday Party Ideas!

Halloween Pizza

This is one of our family's favorite Halloween treats- a pumpkin shaped pizza.

This is our favorite recipe for pizza crust:

4 1/2 C flour

 1 1/2 C water

2 tsp yeast

3 tbsp powdered milk

1 tsp salt

1 tbsp sugar

2 tbsp vegetable oil

In a stand mixer, add water, yeast, and powdered milk.  Mix thoroughly until yeast is dissolved.  Mix the remaining dry ingredients together in a separate container and add them to the mixer.  Mix on low until most of the flour and water have mixed, then continue kneading for 10 minutes.  Dough will be loose and scrappy at first and will quickly form a moist, smooth cohesive ball (while the dough is still scrappy, add the vegetable oil one tablespoon at a time).

After the dough has been kneaded for 10 minutes, remove it from the mixing bowl and, using a rolling pin, roll it out to desired size.  Cover with a towel and let it rise for an hour.  After crust has risen, add sauce, cheese, toppings.  Bake at 500 on pizza stone for 5 minutes or until cheese is melted.

Halloween Spider No Bakes

My kids and I had a fun time making these cute Halloween treats- no bake cookies turned into spiders with M&M's for eyes and pretzels for legs. (My son turned the back one into a black widow). :)   

Here is our favorite recipe for no bake cookies:

2 C sugar

1/2 C cocoa

1/2 C milk

1/2 C butter/marg

2 C oats

1/4 C peanut butter

In saucepan, combine sugar, cocoa; stir in milk and butter.  Bring to boil.  Boil for 3 min.  Stir in oats and peanut butter, return to boil.  Drop on wax paper. 

*Tip- Stir mixture constantly to make sure bottom does not burn.

Homemade Pirate Wig

My son is so excited to be Captain Hook for Halloween.  He is a little obsessed with Captain Hook and pirates.  He already has a Captain Hook costume from Grandma, but he really wanted long black hair to go with his costume.  I didn't really want to buy a wig or spend a lot of money, so I decided to make a wig out of yarn.

  I found some elastic I had laying around the house, sewed it together making a little headband to fit the crown of my son's head.  Then I cut pieces of black yarn (about 2 ft long).  I folded the yarn in half and held it over the elastic as shown in the picture- 

Then I pulled the ends behind the elastic, up through the loop

Then pulled the ends down, so the yarn lays flat and there is a little knot at the bottom of the elastic

Repeated this process until I had a headband of yarn all the way around, except for the front.  I constantly pushed the yarn closer together to make it nice and full.  

(Used less than one skein of yarn)

Looks great under a bandana or pirate hat

Throwing a pirate birthday party??  Check here for some ideas.

More Halloween Digital Scrapbooking Paper

Here's another batch of free Halloween Digital Scrapbooking Paper.  These papers are 3600 x 3600.  To save, click on the image, then right click and select "save image as". (For personal use only)

Free Digital Halloween Scrapbooking Paper

One of my hobbies is to create scrapbooking papers for some of the projects I do digitally.  Here are some free Halloween papers.  To save, click on the image, then right click and select "save image as". 

(For personal use only)