Birthday/pumpkin party

Well, I don't know where the weekends go. it seems like we keep so busy that the weekends pass us by. This weekend was my Grandmother's 86th birthday party. When we were invited we were told that the kids could each decorate a pumpkin for a contest. Now we knew this a week a head of time, but as usual I didn't prepare a head of time. I planned on getting them all done on Saturday. Little did I know a trip to Cabela's was going to take the place of that! Although on the way back from Cabela's there was Walmart. Yes, it was late and yes the kids were sound asleep in the car, but I had to get the stuff to decorate the pumpkins (knowing there would be no time tomorrow). So I took one kiddo and my hubby took the other in, laying over our shoulders half asleep. We ran around gathered what I thought I might need to help my babies decorate their pumpkins.

My 3 year old decided she wanted her pumpkin to be decorated as a lady bug. I am not the most creative person, so I am thinking if I can see a picture I could figure it out. There were not many cute pictures that gave me direction on how to make a lady bug out of a pumpkin. So we decided to do it the easiest way I could think out. We spray painted the whole thing red. Then took black paint. I made a couple lines and told her to paint black in the lines. I made the lines extra thick so there would be little chance she could paint outside of the lines. Then on the front I had made an oval and told her to paint in the oval black. I have to say she did good. I did touch up a little after she was done, but making the thick lines worked. Why it was drying I let her paint her sister's pumpkin.(pic to left) Since we were out so long the day before my 1 year old was sleeping the morning away. I wanted Kara (3) to do a scare crow but she was set on the ladybug. Since Kaylin(1) isn't old enough to have an opinion I chose a scarecrow for her pumpkin. This I did find a picture of on line. Not exactly the same, but gave me a great idea of what to do. Since the whole pumpkin needed to be painted Kara was having fun doing that why I cut out felt circles for the lady bug dots. Kara and I had so much fun making a mess while decorating the pumpkins. After Kara's lady bug dried we took a pipe cleaner and made antenna's and the glued on wiggly eyes and a nose (made of pink construction paper). We also bent and glued a small pink pipe cleaner for the mouth. The I took a piece of ribbon and tied it around the antennas to cover up the globs of glue at the bottom of the antennas. I put a bunch of dots of glue all over the red and handed Kara a handful of the felt circles. She took the time to stick them on, why I went back to helping with the scare crow. I found raffia down stairs from former project. I took hot clue and glued it all around the hat of the scare crow then I cut it to the length I wanted. I took ribbon and made to pony tails and painted on a face. Then I took a scrap piece of material I had left over from the girls costumes and made a bandanna. Both ended up very simple to make and very cute. I had a blast working with my daughter on these. This is how they turned out.

So now that our pumpkins are done, I got together what we needed and went to the party. Of course we were late! (about 20 minutes late) We made it in time for the cake and the contest though! My Grandmother decided it would be a good idea to have Kaylin sit with her why we sang happy birthday. No she was not tempted at all to try and grab one of the two cakes placed in front of her.....not my 1 year old! Although I have to say she did good. I snapped a picture of her attempt and then corrected her!

So after the cake and ice cream. They did the pumpkin contest. My Grandmother was a judge she didn't know what pumpkin belong to which "great grandchild". Her and one of my Aunts worked together to pick a category for each of the pumpkins. My Grandfather participated in picking out two of the prettiest. Which is the category both of my girls received a certificate in; signed "Judge Grandpop"! Then all the winners (everyone) got to pick a prize. Here are pictures of my girls with their grand prize!