Carving Pumpkins for Halloween 2012

Well, last night we decided to carve our pumpkins. Kevin was going to do Ned Flanders as the devil but the stencil was too big for his pumpkin. I offered to shrink it down but he decided that it would be too hard then because of the lines shrinking way down. So...he did a spider instead. I'm actually glad he did because it fits into our whole entryway theme a lot better!

I was a little more ambitious on my carved pumpkin. I created a custom stencil on my computer of Trent Reznor and went from there.

I really wanted to carve this pumpkin last year (and attempted to) but who would have thought that a one month old baby, at the time, would break my concentration and demand all of my attention. Needless to say, last year I broke half of his face and just gave up. This year, I finally was able to create my masterpiece!

Rowen was much more of a help this year too! Look at her having fun:

Rowen's 1st Birthday: Strawberry Banner

I looked online for a few minutes thinking I would be able to find a really cute banner for my daughter's strawberry patch themed birthday party but was completely disappointed with the results. I consider myself to be pretty creative and crafty when I have the time so I decided to make my own banner. My husband, of course, thought I was going overboard on details...if he could only see how much MORE overboard people go on birthday party decor! I started by cutting out the two different strawberry shape sizes and measuring them. From there, I got on my computer and created a file so that I could make sure each letter that I print would fit on the strawberry shapes. Then began lots of cutting and gluing:

From there I added a couple more details like a few green leaf cutouts and white dots for the separator strawberries:

And here is the finished product after a couple paper punches and green yarn: