Oogie Boogie

Finally done! The boy child's costume is finally completed and officially has been through its first test run. It's not exactly like the inspiration photo but close enough. 

We decided to alter it a bit for more leg and arm movement. The legs were most certainly an improvement but the arms could have been better. Also ours glows in the dark which is too much fun. Quinn and I played in the bathroom with the lights out all morning turning his costume into a giant puppet and singing the Oogie Boogie song. I'm pretty sure if anyone were to have walked in on us singing in the dark I would have been sent off to a padded room.

The costume it's self wasn't too hard to make once mom and I thought about it for awhile. Since we didn't have a pattern we just drew every thing right on the fabric and cut from that. Most of the time we use parchment or craft paper to make our patterns but we figured meh it's the boogie man who cares if he's a bit lumpy and uneven. For the face on the hat we cut on the inside and made relief cuts and used the glue gun on the back side and just worked the poly fill in to create the soft sculpt on the eyes and mouth. To finish it we then glued in a piece of black felt for the eyes.

For the body we used an old sheet for the liner and we pinned the layers together to cut the body shape out. Essentially we rounded out the corners a bit, cut straight up the center for his legs, cut the neck, and arms. Then stitched it together on the machine leaving the neck open so we could stuff the poly fill in.

To finish it off I put all the detail stitching in with black yarn, painted it with glow in the dark paint, and hot glued some plastic bugs that I found in the bottom of his toy box.

For the costume we used 2 yards of duck cloth because it was on sale but wish we would have used something lighter and less stiff, 1 skeen of black yarn, 1 old flat sheet for the liner, and not even half a bag of poly fill. The over all shape of this could also be used as a fat suite for a sumo wrestler coustume that I'm now feeling may have been a missed opportunity for some really fun little kid bantering. 

We took Oogie Boogie out in public for the grocery stores kids Halloween night and got rave reviews. I was shuffling him along as people were trying to take the poor kids picture it was like the poperatizi  decended on the small town grocery store. The best part of the trip was the little haunted house, while we were in there Quinn scared the bejesus out of another kid! Quinn stopped to check out the skeleton on the ground then turned around and was pretty much right in this other kids face with his glowing big head. I almost felt bad then thought it was a total score for being abel to scare small people!

Doing Halloween Right!

Have I mentioned my Pinterest addiction? 

My most beloved holiday is nearly upon us and I finally started the boy child's costume. Last month we started the discussion of what he would want to be and he said dinosaur. While I would typically be stoked for this choice I was a bit underwhelmed since he was already a dragon (dinosaur with wings). 

I started perusing Pinterest and came across the cutest hot air balloon piolit costume and thought it would be a shoe win with Quinn. 

Well he is obviously growing up because he was pretty much totally disinterested even though he has an unhealthy obsession with balloons. 

So what's a mom to do?!? Well this mom all but forced the small child to sift through Pinterest with me till we could find the perfect idea. We went through all the typical costumes vampire, knight, hobbit, you name it we looked at it. Then out of some small dark corner of the inter webs poped up a tiny human dressed as Oogie Boogie from Nightmare Before Christmas. 

Quinn has only seen commercials for this movie as it's still a bit to scary for the child with a wild imignation. But he was so drawn to it, I let him watch a YouTube clip of the Oogie Boogie song, and what do you know this kid was sold! I have never been so excited for a silly costume, this movie is one of my all time favorites and I finally have a reason to dress up like a Tim Burton character. 

I love my little man so much and he gets gold stars this year. I think this might be one of those October baby traits, they just inherently know how to do Halloween the right way. I'm really hoping we pull this off because whoever originally made this rocks. Here's hoping mom and I manage to pull this one off without killing each other!

P.S. Mom- I promise I'll pick up the elastic and really do love that you put up with us, well particularly all of the crazy project ideas. 

Party Like A Pirate

I have this thing about birthdays ever since I can remember my birthday has been plagued with bad juju from stubbed toes, stomach flu, to forgotten 16th birthdays. This has made me a bit nuts when it comes to Quinn, I decided that this child will never know what a miserable birthday is. I will absorb whatever bad juju is thrown at me just so long as I can make his birthdays amazing till the day I die! 

Today was the big day and another awesome over the top party is in the books! I'm totally exhausted after this one. There were so many last minute things this year from balloons to cake but everyone that helped pulled through and we got it done just in time. But at the end of the day all that matters is that Quinn had the most awesome special day that this mom could dream up. 

This year the queen of theme birthdays went with pirates, because let's face it who doesn't like yelling out ARRR MATEY and quoting Jack Sparrow "Where's the rum gone?!?!". My crazy gets a bit out there, all little kid birthdays MUST have a dress up component so the theme has to be chosen wisely. If I were to let Quinn be the sole deciding factor I'd run the risk of having to dress up all the kids as Paw Patrol dogs. Don't get me wrong Paw Patrol would be cool but my mom would kill me, I come up with cockamamie ideas and she executes the overly crafty stuff. So the designer  part of my brain decided we needed a big boat, tatoo parlor, dress up, treasure, and of course a ton of balloons. The kids all had a great time and behaved like perfect little scalawags. And best of all Quinn thought it was great and just might love me even a little bit more after today.

My dad wasn't pleased but he sure did look festive

Even the goofy big kids like to play

Best big kid gift ever!

I tried to get him to wake up tonight to turn 4 years old, but in true fashion this kid feel asleep 15 minutes early and not a bomb could have got him up. I just sang happy birthday at the top of my lungs to a kid that was out cold that told me to go away while he pushed at my face. Oh well maybe I'll have better luck next year getting him to celebrate at midnight.  

Choosing Joy

So I have been sitting here tonight scrolling through the 1,000 Quinn photos I have taken this past year and realized we have done some pretty amazing things with some awesome people! Sometimes I forget just how truly blessed my little family is to have such great friends and family that we get to share life with. Lately I kind of feel like 'adulting' has been harder than it needs to be, and I feel silly because clearly I'm hung up on one little moment. All I have to do is look through all these memories and see how much we have done and all the little things that have brought so much joy.

Planting feathers (he was convinced that with a bit of water and sun he could grow a bird)

 (first concert since college!!)

T ball super star he just so happened to batt lefty

Fireworks with friends even the grumpy cat in the back...

VACATION!!! Seriously this is my happy place

Butterfly house with nana and cousins. Quinn's aunt wouldn't come, she's afraid of butterflies...

Coolest museum exhibit in the history of museums! TMA Rocks

What families are made of

Us and all of our weird out in the open

This is a total photo bomb but this blog is about making myself happy and adding joy to my life and these moments are my joy. This little boy and all of the great people in our life make every minute worth it, so though I may complain and even whine about life this is really what it's all about.

Birthday Time!!

It's that time of year again, Quinn is about to be FOUR!! So I'm still that mom and back on my perfect party war path. This year we decided the theme will be pirates complete with dress up,  a home made pirate ship, and any over abundance of goofy pirate talk. My Pinterest addiction is at its peak and I have too many ideas this year https://www.pinterest./jessie2284/party-like-a-pirate/. I'm feeling a bit behind but the invites were actually sent out on time and we made one rockin pirate ship! Amazing what can be done with boxes, duct tape, and a load of .99 cent spray paint! This party is going to be a total score in the cool mom book.

Oups

Ok mega epic fail... So my schedule has changed and l get the pleasure of bringing little dude to his preschool classes now!! Super excited about this, it's one of the things that was making me feel like I was failing in the mom department. I finally have met his teacher and all seems right in the world. He comes to the Y three days a week and his Monday Wednesday class is the same and his Friday is math. Here I am walking him in on Friday thinking that his class is in the same room because it's the only one set up all cute. Well I just dropped him off in the wrong flippin class. No one said anything!!! So now I'm sitting here and have no idea what to do!!! Maybe it's me but don't you think the teacher would have said something like hey your kids not in this class... Oh well kinda the story of my life one fail at a time

From the mouths of babes

Sometimes these are just too good not to share.

Quinn jumping up and down non stop:

Jess-where do you get all of this energy?

Quinn- I eat too much

Quinn and his new friend 'Siri':

Quinn- Green power waner

Siri- I don't understand 

Quinn- (determined voice) Green power waner

Siri- that's an interesting question I don't understand

This went on for 10 freaking minutes!!!

Middle of the night sleep walking potty run:

On his way back to bed he missed the ladder and cracked his head on his loft bed.

Quinn- ahh Quintin that hurt (note: talks to self in third person while sleep walking)

He quickly scooted up ladder grabbed pillow and made a run for our bed post haste.

Bath time:

Dad- knock it off, you know better stop splashing

Quinn- keeps splashing

Dad- is there a reason your not listening?!?!

Quinn- it's the last time I'm going to be able to splash as a kid! (I hope you read that with a little kid whiny voice)

Evidently he thinks 4 is entering adulthood...