Category: Kids parties

DIY Halloween props

With Halloween only days away, I thought I’d share with you some of the things I’ve made for this year’s Halloween party! Notice I didn’t say just say “Halloween” that’s because in my house, it’s become more about the party than it has the actual night! Sorry kids! 🤣

Anyway, this year is going to be a blast and I wanted to share with you some fun, cheap DIY projects that you too can do at home with some pretty basic supplies!

1. Dollar store hanging pen

This one was really cheap and really easy to make, you could honestly stick anything inside it too, I just wanted something fun and easy to hang near the street, so opted for what a I’ve got.

What you’ll need: 2 baskets from the dollar store (sorry Aussies, you’ll have to pick some up from one of the cheap shops, I know they’re not a dollar, but still pretty reasonable). I spray painted them black with spray paint I already had but you can pick up cheap spray paint from Walmart or even your local hardware store.

I bought 2 stake (as in you normally stake them in to the ground) glow-in-the-dark arms from Dollar Tree as well as one of their skulls. I bought a mop also from there. I had an empty lacquer thinner container that I used as my ‘body’ (after I had rinsed it, of course) and got one of my son’s old shirts.

Get your dollar store mop and remove some of the strands:

I got a glue gun and took the strands from the mop and glued them to my skull. Nothing fancy, just gluing wherever they looked good. Then it’s a matter of putting it all together, I’ve seen similar projects with skeletons inside the baskets or even homemade ‘monsters’, as I said I opted for something super simple. The process was very easy and maybe took all of 20 mins (excluding drying time).

I grabbed the lacquer thinner container and drilled a hole on each side for the arms to slit into and put a dab of hot glue to hold them in place. I also hot glued the skull on to where the lid formally lived. Then it was just a matter of putting the shirt on and placing him in the basket.

After the baskets were dry (having sprayed both inside and outside of each) I placed my ‘half-guy’ into the basket and put the other one on top. I placed the hands where a I wanted them to go and zip tied everything in place. Then it was a matter of putting a couple of Dollar Tree rats on the outside of the cage and a chain from there also and zip tying those into place too. It has been outside in all sorts of weather and still looks great!

2. Dollar store trophies

I wanted to give out trophies this year as well as the prizes we regularly give out, but didn’t want to spend a fortune on them so I grabbed these from Dollar Tree:

and made them into these:

Super easy too! All you do is give the skull a light sanding and using acrylic paint, darken the already darkened areas on the skull. Grab a light grey paint (or gold/brown or whatever colour you like) then go over everything else, leaving the darkened spots in place to contrast. The great thing is that if you make a mistake, you can easily go back over it with whatever paint you need to!

Then I got a candle (also from Dollar Tree) that fitted into the top of the trophy perfectly. I hot glued this in place (just the lids so that if someone wants to use the candle they still can). Some of the candles I painted in a metallic acrylic paint, others I left as is. I printed out trophy names on the printer, cut them out and modpodged them to the candle cases. I glued hair on some and not on others, there’s even one as a gag trophy to a friend of ours because he promised to finally wear a costume to this year’s party! 😆

Let me know what you think. And if you try this yourself, I’d love to see your photos!

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Dr. Seuss Themed, Book Week, Door Decorating

I volunteer in my 6 year old’s class once a week to help with extra reading and his teacher asked if I could help with a book week door design – oh yes I can! Lol. I went on Pinterest and looked for ideas as to how to encourage young readers to get excited about reading and found some awesome ideas, including varied options for the “I will read” saying, inside of an extended version of Cat’s Hat.

Credit from Pinterest (I can’t find the site again to give proper credit)
The beginning drawing
A close up of Cat’s face – though I did edit him a tad during the painting phase

Everywhere I looked there was the Cat’s hat, but what about Cat himself? I grabbed one of my son’s books and freehand drew the cat. He turned out pretty great! Lol. I honestly don’t know how to help you draw him other than to say it might help to look at the picture in grids and draw each grid independently, sometimes baby steps are the best, rather than looking at the bigger picture.

The drawing was the easy part though, trying to copy the font for the passage on the right had to be the most time-consuming! Painting was certainly no easy task either, but the rewards are immediate! I did however make a mistake and tried to erase my pencil marks too quickly (see photo). But all in all, I was very happy with the results!

I did everything at home other than the handprints of course! This afternoon I had the lovely pleasure of assisting each first grader in dipping their hand in paint thereby adding their personal touch to this door cover. It was so much fun! The teacher had photos of each and every child that we stuck in the middle of their handprint. It worked out really well and I love it! I’ll never have another first grader, but I’ll always have this amazing memory! Even the teacher put her handprint on there!

If you enjoy reading my crazy, varied blogs, please subscribe here on WordPress. Sharing is caring, so feel free to share with your friends. I’m on Facebook: Aussie Mum’s Adventures. You can find me on Twitter: @ozmumsadventures, on Instagram: Ozmumsadventures, on Pinterest: Aussiemumsadventures And please subscribe to my YouTube channel: Aussie Mum’s Adventures (I’m still working on it, so please have patience with me!).

Répondez s’il vous plaît 

RSVP. Répondez s’il vous plaît. Literally translated into English meaning ‘respond please’. It has been a term used for a very long time, probably originating when King Louis XIV, at his palace of Versailles, created a set of rules in the form of a ‘ticket’ or, in French; ‘etiquette’, setting out the guidelines for the correct way to behave when in his Court. These ‘tickets’ were either put up around Versailles or sent out on the back of invitations. Though, this is but one theory of the origin of the term and how we still use it today when talking about modern etiquette, it certainly makes sense given the French led the way for etiquette in the modern world through the 19th Century. 
Why such background information on this blog? Well I guess it serves as a reminder that even in this day and age of incredible technology, where snail mail is rarely used anymore, one can still have manners! 
A few weeks ago, my daughter was having her 8th birthday party. We sent out invitations (my daughter handed them out at school with her teacher’s help) to 8 girl friends, 18 days in advance. Why 18 days? Well, I guess I thought three weeks was too long and two weeks was too short, so I found a happy medium. The party consisted of two parts; a sleep over with the option of me picking them up from school directly or the parents delivering children to our house (enabling them to meet me, ensure we were hygienic etc), and a party the following morning at something called a kids’ café. The café needed numbers, as does anywhere one books a party, so we gave them 10 (we have three kids of our own including the birthday girl). I made it clear on the invitation that each child was more than welcome to do either one or the other or both, that was entirely up to the parent but I did need an RSVP. I gave them my mobile phone number, my name and said please call or text by the Monday prior. 
Now let me give you a little bit of background information about what it’s like to live in an expat community as part of a Military Installation in South Korea: the children are bused to and from school. Most people are only allowed one car, meaning getting about can sometimes pose a problem, this is because of an agreement with the Korean Government, so not something that can be trifled with (Driving in Korea can be scary anyway, so it’s actually a good thing). Given that we have only been here for 5 months, we had only been to one school function for our daughter’s class and it was a play. We brought donuts, watched the kids perform then left the kids to their donut party, not really something we socialized at. Our daughter had been to two birthday parties though, but one of the girls had already PCS’d (military acronym for moving when the military tells you to move) & I did have the other girl’s mother’s number. 

Right back to the story……
The invitations were handed out. 1 week passed. Nothing. On day 12, the Friday before the response was due, I asked my daughter to remind her friends to RSVP through their parents. I gave her some cards (yes, I have cards with my telephone number and blog website on them – some even have the names and ages of my kids on the back so I can give them to other mothers with whom I meet and connect, that way they can remember who I was, who my kids are and which of their kids would connect with mine). She gave out a couple of them and reminded them to get their parents to let me know. Day 15: RSVP requested date. Nothing. Day 16, I again asked her to remind her friends to let us know if they could come, the party was on the Friday night/Saturday morning and it was now Tuesday. I then sent a text to the only mother who’s number I had and gently reminded her of the party on Friday night, she almost immediately responded and said yes, her daughter would be there, but she wouldn’t sleep over or come the next morning. Ok, at least one child was coming. I also asked if she had any other parents’ information and she had one of them and said she would find out if this other little girl was coming. On the Thursday night, I heard from this same mother who told me that yes, the other little girl would be coming but also not staying the night, nor would she be at the café the following morning. I appreciated her letting me know, though I did question why the girl in question’s own mother or father couldn’t respond to me directly. Odd. Finally, at 7pm, I got a call from one of the other little girls who said yes, she was coming and she was staying the night! Yay! A little late but my little girl was literally starting to feel heartbroken at the thought that no one wanted to come to her party nor stay the night with her, so this made her very happy.  At 9pm, I got a text from one other mother saying that her daughter would be there on Friday night.

 Four out of eight. As for the other 4 girls, I’ve still not heard from any of their parents. Just plain slack and inconsiderate as far as I’m concerned. 
As it turned out, only one little girl stayed the night and the other little girl, who’s mother sent me the text at 9pm, did come to the party the following morning, though she didn’t stay. We had booked a party for 10 kids and had paid a deposit. We were unsure how it would work when we turned up with only 5 so I asked my neighbours’ little girls to come along, literally at the very last minute (they go to school with my son and are his very dear friends). Luckily they could join us and wow, did we have a great time! 


The slumber party turned into “The best party ever,” according to all the little girls who came. We did makeup, nails and toenails. My girlfriend came along to help out and brought costume jewelry too. We let the girls decorate our faces after we done theirs and they loved it! We had an ice cream bar that any fro yo place would have been jealous of and it was just a lot of fun. 


But what if I hadn’t reached out to that mother? What if my daughter hadn’t gone to school every day for a week and asked everyone to remind their parents to let us know? Why has society gone in the direction of not using common courtesy, even decency, anymore? I admit we have gotten so busy that I have forgotten to RSVP on time, but I have always sent a response as soon as I’ve remembered. My heart was literally breaking for my little girl when she came home on the Tuesday before the party and we still hadn’t heard from anyone. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to strangle the necks of the parents or just burst into tears at the devastation on my baby’s face. It shouldn’t have come down to that! 
We live in an age where our children grow up far too quickly as it is. I know there are far more important things going on in the world than a simple RSVP, but when that lack of response means breaking a child’s heart, it should be important. It should be of the utmost importance. We are letting our own busy lives, our procrastinating tendencies, our own slackness all get in the way of the little things that make life grand when you are a child, things like an 8th birthday party! And I haven’t even discussed the implications when it comes to events like weddings
Répondez s’il vous plaît. RSVP. It’s more than just about you!