Moana Inspired Halloween Costumes

Make way! Make Way! This year our family costumes were Moana inspired! 

Sophie received her Moana dress as a birthday present from her friend back in March, and then I created costumes for the rest of the family to match her. Davey was Maui (the demigod), I was Te Fiti (mother earth) and Dave was Te Ka (the lava demon). Dave and I were actually not planning to dress up, but a few days ago before our Halloween party I started having regrets, so I hit up Goodwill and got creative. I probably went a little overboard, but it was a fun project and Soph was thrilled when she saw us all dressed up

Moana & Maui: I ordered Sophie's necklace off eBay for a couple bucks and then stuck a flower in her hair to complete the look. It was nice to have one costume be super simple! 

Maui took a little more effort. I found a plain tan shirt at our local consignment store and then, using Sophie's toy Maui as a guide, drew tattoos with Sharpies all over the shirt. 

It took a lot longer than anticipated, but luckily I had Netflix to keep me entertained while I colored, and colored, and colored. I know have a new respect for tattoo artists. Luckily his skirt came together much quicker with just some leaves cut from felt that I tied around his waist. 

I don't even know why I try to take pictures of the two of them without Dave around to help entertain/distract. They pretty much never turn out. 

Te Fiti: I had no plan in mind for this costume and just used what happened to be available at Goodwill the day I went shopping - a giant green body pillow, a twin size sheet patterned with tree branches, and some random flowers. 

I used the pillow, with the stuffing removed, to create Te Fiti's long hair. Next I made the sheet into a robe using a free pattern I found online. I'm an amateur when it comes to sewing, but the pattern only involved five rectangles and straight lines so it wasn't too bad. Finally I made a crown with the flowers and scotch tape. 

Te Ka was the final costume, but I forgot to take pictures. The robe was a slimmed down graduation robe from Goodwill that I painted with flames. I would like to note that it took several coats of paint because the fabric of the robes was pretty thin and the paint would just soak right through. Our back patio now has some lovely red, orange, and yellow spots :) I made the crown with construction paper coated with modge podge to make it look glossy, and help hold things together, and then Dave completed the look with some face paint. 

The Moana Birthday Party

This year we had Sophie's first birthday party. In previous years we had a few family members over for cake and presents, but this year she asked to have an actual party with friends, games, prizes, etc...the real deal. I agreed and her top two requests were to to have it be Moana themed and to play pin the tail on the donkey. Easy enough, right?

The invitations I made

Unfortunately, Moana is still a relatively new movie so there weren't many ideas out on Google or Pintrest yet to help me brainstorm. In the end I  had to do most of the creative thinking on my own and spent way too much time and energy planning this party, but it was fun and she LOVED it so I guess it was worth it. Next birthday is definitely going to be more low key though, like eating cake at a park.

I also had a lot of trouble finding Moana-themed stuff at the store. The stuff online was super expensive, and the party section at Walmart had a single table cloth left. My mom managed to find some cups at a craft store that we used as well, but that was it. For the rest we just did balloons, streamers, and a homemade banner.

I did see on Pintrest the idea to put leaves on the blades of a ceiling fan to make it look like a palm tree. It's hard to see in the picture, but I tried it and it actually turned out pretty cute. 

I did all the prep the night before, and then my mom came to help me the day of the party. Dave was supposed to be defending his thesis that day, but it got rescheduled, so he was there to help as well. I was so glad to have them both there because we ended up with 8 kids, and Davey didn't nap that afternoon so I would have had my hands full!

Waiting for the party to start

Grandmari gave her the Moana shirt as an early birthday present so she could wear it to the party 

I had planned out a few games to play, and then we ate cake and did presents. After it was all done I just let the kids play until parents came to take them home. There were only a few tears shed (by my own child) and the kids seemed to have a lot of fun, so I'm calling it a success!!

PRIZE BAGS: Each game we played had a little prize they could win (goldfish crackers, fruit snack, etc...) that would then go in their prize bag. I put a different character on each bag so they could easily identify which one was theirs. By the end of the party each guest had some fun treats to take home!

FISHING GAME: This is a classic that all little kids love. We moved our baby gate on the stairs up higher, draped a beach towel over, and then Dave hid behind it to attach bags of goldfish to the clip. They had such a fun time with this, and we had some extra treats on hand for the kids who wanted to do it a second time. They really had no idea there was a person behind there until the end when the towel slipped and someone saw his hand. 

LIMBO: Our limbo had no real rules, which made it more fun. We put on some music from the movie and kept lowering the bar while they crawled back and forth as fast as they could. 

WARMER/COLDER FIND MAUI'S HOOK: I forgot to take a picture of this game. The kids took turns hiding a treat with a picture of Maui's hook on it, while someone was out of the room. They would then give clues to that person to help them find the hook by saying "warmer" when they were close, and "colder" when they got farther away. We had them go in teams, since the concept was a little tricky for some kids to understand. After they found the hook and treat, it went in their prize bag!

KAKAMORA BOWLING: the Kakamora are little pirates dressed in coconut armor that attack Moana and Maui. I saw an idea online where someone made palm trees out of 2-liter bottles and then went bowling with a coconut painted like a Kakamora, but I thought it would be more fun to actually bowl down the Kakamora! I printed out pictures of their faces, taped them to brown lunch sacks, and then put a roll of toilet paper inside each one to make them more stable. Dave bought a coconut at the grocery store and it worked great! I let them all have two rolls to try and knock down as many as they could, and then at the end we let them all have another turn if they wanted to try again. 

TAMATOA TARGET PRACTICE: in the movie Moana and Maui have to get past a giant crab named Tamatoa. I printed out a picture and was going to just have the kids throw things at him, but then I randomly found these chicken flingers in the dollar section at Target and thought this would be way more fun, especially since they look like Hei Hei from the movie. They did have a great time with this activity, and got to keep the chicken afterward to take home!

TE KA VOLCANOES: The final challenge for Moana is to confront a lava demon named Te Ka. The night before I filled a bunch of mini water bottles with 2 parts vinegar, 1 part water, and a drop of dish soap (this combination give a slower, longer reaction than just straight vinegar). I put each bottle in a pan and let the kids choose a color for their lava (food coloring), and then gave them some baking soda to scoop in. Eruption time!!

PIN THE HEART ON TE FITI: This was our final game. Sophie had specifically asked to play pin the tail on the donkey at her party, so we put a Moana twist on it and had them try to tape the "heart" stone on a picture of Te Fiti. She placed hers perfectly in the center, so I suspect there may have been some peeking :)

I was worried that maybe I had over planned, but we got through all the games in a little over an hour. To help with transitions, I had queued up several songs from the movie on my computer. I would play them between the games so they would have something to watch while I set up the next activity. As you can see, it drew them right in and worked like a charm!

I am not a master baker or decorator, so we just frosted a regular cake blue and put a Moana toy on top, which looked great and was a fun souvenir for her to keep for later!

Opening presents

The girls immediately started playing with a princess set she received as a gift, while the boys got out our box of cars. Davey seemed to know which group he belonged in. 

And one of Sophie's friends who couldn't be there was so nice to give her this Moana dress. She loves it and I think I know what she will be wearing for Halloween now!

Painting the Fence

For some reason Crayola paints were on sale for earth day (I don't really understand the connection, but nice for us!), so I bought Sophie the 10 pack. On Saturday I diluted them with water, gave her sponge brush, and let her paint our vinyl fence! I have never let her do anything with paints so she LOVED it. It was a great activity until she got upset about me mixing orange wrong, which led to some paint dumping, and a ticket inside for her. Oh the emotions of a three year old...

The only downside was the clean up didn't go quite as smooth as I had hoped.  Almost all of the paint sprayed right off with the hose, but I didn't dilute the blue enough and it didn't come off as easy. I had to get out the gloves, brush, and put in some elbow grease to get the fence back to white. Now I know for next time!

She asked me to paint a "Sophie"

My artist with her mural

Back to white again!

Ward Halloween Party and the Fish Costume

This week was our ward Halloween party. It was supposed to be a trunk-or-treat, but rain moved the activity indoors. Families each claimed a small space of the gym and the kids walked around to gather candy. Since Sophie is now old enough to understand Halloween, I let her choose her own costume (she finally settled on a fish), and then Dave and I were a fishing pole and fisherman to match.

And the big surprise this year is that I made Sophie's costume! When I started looking for a fish costume online all I could find was Nemo from the Disney store (not that cute for the price) and one from Pottery Barn (very cute, but also ridiculously expensive), so I decided to make one. I found some pictures online for inspiration and got to work. 

My original plan was to just glue things together, but I have a sewing machine from my grandma that she gave me and thought, how hard could it be?! Let just say I saved a lot of money (total cost for this costume was $5), but it took me probably 15-20 hours to finish. I know nothing about sewing.... one time it took me two hours of bunched thread and jammed fabric because I didn't realize the needle was in backwards. Definitely a learning experience, but I'm proud of how it turned out!

My cute little fish

Her costume from the back - she really loved her fin and tail

Dave got some gummy worms to go with his costume. They weren't supposed to be for eating, but Sophie really wanted one and Dave decided to let her try to bite it off the hook. She was successful and the other kids at the party noticed... they started calling him "worm guy" and followed him around hoping for a tasty treat .

Family Photo Mosaic

There is a free program you can download from the internet that will arrange photos into a mosaic of any image you choose. I have been wanting to try it out and decided that my dad’s birthday would be a good reason to put one together.

The program is easy to use, the hard part is gathering, rotating, and cropping the 800 pictures I used to make my mosaic. The final product contains over 1,200 pictures (some are used twice) and I am really happy with the way it turned out!

My family loves skiing so I chose two skiers as the main image

Close up of part of the mountain near the bottom right

Best of 2011

I have tons of pictures on my computer just taking up space on my hard drive. Some of them make it on to the blog, but I hardly ever have them printed, and if I do, they just sit in an envelope in my closet. Last year I decided it was time to do something more.

I searched through all the pictures we had taken since 2006, picked my favorite 10-15 from each year, and then had each year printed as an 8x10 collage. These are now hanging in my hall and I LOVE to look at them. It's so fun to look back at our life over the past 5 years and remember all the fun things we've done - trips, dates, family events, holidays, etc...

The 2011 Edition (that will join the photo wall as soon as I get a frame)

 

Some highlights of 2011 include: skiing at Snowbird, cheering on Jimmer and the BYU basketball team, our 5 year anniversary, a trip to the North Carolina coast with the Howe family, attending the final Harry Potter movie premiere, spending time with the Lamberts in Utah, and Christmas with the Howe family in Texas. It was a great year!!

A New Life for Old Ensigns

I recently decided that because you can access the Ensign online, and because shelf space in our apartment is in high demand, it just wasn't practical to save every issue. I, however, was having a hard time just tossing them in the recycling... So I decided to create my own "Gospel Art Kit: Part II."

Now when I finish reading an issue, I go through it with a pair of scissors and cut out all the awesome pictures that go with the stories. Here are some samples of what I've collected over the past couple months:

Old Testament Stories

New Testament Stories & Life of Christ

Book of Mormon Stories

The Restoration & Church History

As you can see, I don't have that many pictures yet from the Book of Mormon or Church History, but I'm sure it will build over time. For now, I keep all the pictures in an organizer with a separate pocket for each "set." I'm really looking forward to having these to use for FHE lessons, primary classes, Sunday School, and who knows what else.  It's a cheap, easy project that' I'm sure will be a great resource for years to come!