Christmas Activities

I Love the Holidays!

Lights of Tanea

If you live in the Reno/Sparks area you know what a cool place this is to see.

It's one home that really knows how to decorate for the Holidays.

The lights are set to the music of TSO.

MJ ready and waiting to go!

I always try to get at least one family picture.

Summit Tree Lighting!

There are a couple of tree lighting's in Sparks/Reno. This one is my favorite.

Smile say cheese!

Thank Goodness Mark has long arms:)

Of course MJ and his fairy wand fascination.

My 2 favorite men.

I am very lucky that I found such a great man!

MJ was so excited to see Santa. I wasn't quick enough on the clicker to get the pic of Santa shaking MJ's hand.

Tree Lighting



Christmas Is Upon Us

Christmas Crafts w/MJ

Another Christmas tradition in our home is MJ and I make a few handmade ornaments for our tree. This year we decided to make dough ornaments. Super easy and MJ loves playing with dough.

All you need is salt, flour and water.

1c Salt

1c Flour

1/2c Water (more or less)

Kneed and roll out dough.

Then using cookie cutters (hand for Santa Ornament) cut out your shapes

bake @ 200 for 3 hrs

Paint, seal and ready to hang

I rolled this our to about 1/4 inch thickness

Using a cookie cutter, cut out desired shape. I used a wooded skewer to make the hole to loop the ribbon.

After cutting our shapes, line a baking sheet with parchment paper and bake @ 200 for about 3 hrs

Once the dough is completely cooled, we are ready for paint.

This was MJ favorite part. Why is the messiest task always the funnest for my little Monkey?

MJ finished painting all his ornaments.

I added all the detailed work.

Lots of fun and they make great gifts!

Just make sure your mark them fragile and use lots of bubble wrap when you mail em :)

Halloween Festivities

So many activities around the Holidays.

I have said it 100x if you can't find something to do then it's because you either don't know how to use Googgle or just too freaking LAZY to look!

Here are some or the festivities we attended:

This is from the same peeps that do Lights Of Tanea. If you are from this area check em out.

They did a Halloween themed light show. Granted it was on a much smaller scale, but was fun to watch.

Downtown Reno did a great event called Halloween Hallow.

We got a map and hit all the shops listed and MJ begged for some Candy

 

The also had a few activities for the kids. Bounce house, face painting, carnival games etc

MJ loved taking the pic with SPCA mascot

As MJ put it, The map to all the treasures!

I loved how they made the map like one of my other favorite events, The Rive Wine Walk:)

I'm a Ninja!!

This was for our Moms/Kids Group Halloween Party!

Also lots of fun:0

SO FREAKIN CUTE!!

 Venom is in the HOUSE!!
We took the kids to the Spanish Springs High School for Trick or Treat in the Halls. This was off the Hook!

Yes, as a matter of fact Venom WAS in the Wizard of Oz!

No time to chat they have places to go and people with candy to see.

Trick or Treating with the cast of The Wizard of Oz

Legends at Sparks Marina

And finally the big night.

This is the first year we let him go to the doors alone.

Once he realized he was getting candy to do this,

there was no stopping him

Looks like a still from a "Have you seen this person" wanted poster!

I think he loved passing out the candy just as much as the Trick or Treating. Best thing is he got sooooo much candy that we didn't have to buy any. We just gave out most of what he got. There were so many bags he will never miss it.

And of course the Craft Projects.

I got this idea last year and decided to do it this time. All this is are felt bats, houses, ghosts, pumpkins, moon, stars, tomb stones etc. that I cut out. I nailed a felt back drop and MJ had tons of fun with it.

Halloween Ghost Craft

October is Craftober!

Well, that's what we call it here in the Nickel House:)

Today's craft is a Halloween Ghost using stuff you probably have around the house already.

Here's what your gonna need:

1 white plastic table cover
A few sheets of white tissue
Lots of plastic grocery bags
Ribbon or string to tie
Marker for the face or you can print on line
Scissors

First you are gonna stuff a grocery bag full of all those other grocery bags you have everywhere!

Then you want to start forming it into a head

I wrapped a few sheets of tissue for 2 reasons:

1 - to cover some of the print of the plastic bags

2 - Helps give it a smoother surface

Once you have it the way you want it. Tie it off with the ribbon or string

Cut the plastic table cover in half. You will have enough to make 2 ghosts

Cover the plastic ball you just made with the table cover

Tie it off with ribbon again.

I took some scissors and shredded the bottom

I chose to glue on the face instead of using a marker.

If it seems it won't form well on the face, cut the face away from the mouth and

you will be able to glue the facial features on the ghost head better.

Or just make a face with a black marker

Wait for it to dry completely

And he's ready for hanging!

HaPpY HaLlOwEeN!!!!