Halloween 2014!

I am not a very big fan of Halloween. I just don't enjoy being scared. My husband on the other hand LOVES Halloween, it is pretty safe to say that it is his favorite holiday. Aidan seems to like being scared too, he thinks it is hilarious. Don't get me wrong I'm all for adorable little costumes and some candy but that is about as far as it goes. Luckily, Brian limited the body parts and decapitated head decorations this year.

This was the first year Aidan decided what he was going to be for Halloween. His first Halloween he was 6 months old and I dressed him as a bat. The next year, at 18 months, I dress him as Mickey Mouse. In 2013, at 2, he and Daisy went as Tod and Copper from The Fox and the Hound. This year the only thing he wanted to be was a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle! Leonardo to be exact. I had a hard time finding a TMNT costume that I liked for him. There were some cute toddler ones but he was too big for them, and the older kid ones had really thin material with a 1990's plastic mask for $30. (And I figured I would have to buy some thermals for him to wear under the costume because it never fails that Cincinnati has frigid temperatures on Halloween.) 

So, I decided I was going to make his costume! Have I mentioned I don't didn't know how to sew? Well I have never really sewed, I never took a class in high school, no one taught me how. I just read the manual on my moms sewing machine (that I'm not sure if she has ever used) and used Google and Pinterest to teach myself. I also didn't have any patterns. I made my own patterns using some of Aidan's clothes as an outline with some directions from these two sites:
http://littlestonecape.blogspot.com/2012/05/diy-toddler-pajama-pants-pattern.html
http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/post/845273/347663103
The pants were super easy! The shirt I had a harder time with, especially the sleeves. Then for the shell I completely improvised. I used an oval serving tray to trace the shape. I cut out a hexagon with my Cricut Explore to use as a pattern on the shell, then used some satin stitching to dress it up a little bit. I was thrilled with how it turned out! Could it have been better? Of course, but I don't think I did too bad for a first timer! I bought 6 yards of fabric, 2 of green fleece, and 2 each of tan and brown felt. I had the elastic for the pants, but did have to buy a couple spools of thread and some velcro. I spent around $20 and the costume was plenty warm for him, plus he loved it! Here are some pictures of the costume progress...

I also made him, and my nephew (also a Ninja Turtle), personalized Trick or Treat buckets out of $.44 sand buckets from Michael's and some vinyl I had on-hand! I got the svg to cut the vinyl from this site: http://www.kraftynook.blogspot.com/search?q=tmnt She makes a ton of awesome svgs! Look up her blog if you have a Cricut Explore, you won't regret it!

Every year my in-laws take their camper up to Eastfork State Park for their big Halloween camp out! They usually invite all of my family to come for Trick or Treating as well so Aidan and Landon were able to Trick or Treat together!

As you can see above Aidan had some trouble with his mask. So we put it on his forehead so people would know he was Leonardo and he could still see. :)

The weekend after camping we went to the Cincinnati Zoo for their annual HallZOOween event. Local vendors hand out candy and coupons and the animals usually join in on some fun with "Pumpkin Pandemonium" their own special version of Trick or Treat. We have annual passes so we only went for a few hours, picked up some candy, saw some animals and rode the train. The zoo is always crazy for holiday events! Some people were waiting a considerable amount of time for two tootsie rolls... We passed. It was the absolute most beautiful weather the weekend we decided to go so that didn't help with crowd control either; but we still had fun.

Aidan has never been one for pictures!

In fact, he was standing on a rock wall for this picture- about 3 feet up- as soon as I snapped the picture he said "Okay, I'm done." Then stepped right off of the ledge, before any of us could stop him, landed on his face and busted his lip open :( there was quite a bit of blood! It was not the best way to start the day, he still continued to enjoy his time there.

Leonardo checking on Leatherhead! (I watch TMNT waaaay too often these days!)

The black bears eating their pumpkins!

And last but not least, on Halloween night we had some of Brian's family over and did Trick or Treating around our neighborhood. Brian and his dad took Aidan and Brian's cousin's little boy Blake out and his cousin and I handed out candy. It was great meeting some neighbors but it was FREEZING outside!

Thanks for sticking around to finish reading this novel that I wrote today! I will be posting again soon! :)