More Halloween Decorations

Dollar Store Skeleton Lights

I got this decoration idea from the Dollar Store Craft Website. It was so amazingly easy to make out of straw decorations a string of Xmas lights. I used fishing line to attach the legs to the bodies.

Baby Food Jar Bats

My son and I made these cute bats out of baby food jars and templates from the Family Fun Website. We painted the bottles black and put a battery operated light inside to make it flicker.

Have a happy, and safe, Halloween!

Halloween Decorations - Tabletop Haunt

My son wanted to put up Halloween decorations this year, so we did a little research on DIY projects. We found this haunted house (from the Disney Family Fun website) made from cardboard boxes and craft paint. For the ghosts, I crumpled up a plastic grocery bag and wrapped it with Kleenex.

I put a single bulb light fixture, from the dollar store, inside the box to light up the windows.

Another project coming tomorrow...

More Bead Storage

I found a great spice rack at a nearby garage sale that I use to store seed beads. I love this repurpose. Glass make it easy to see color and quantity in each bottle and the tops have a sprinkle or pour feature.

Unmounted Rubber Stamps

Long ago, I used to collect rubber stamps. Typically, it was cheaper to purchase unmounted rubber images then permanently mount the rubber to a piece of wood on your own. Problem is, storing all the wood blocks take up a lot of space.

My auntie recently introduced me to a way to organize stamps by mounting them with a sticky back foam. Stamps can be kept on sheet protectors and transferred to an acrylic block when in use, then transferred back to the plastic sheet for storage. I use small drawer knobs to use for smaller stamps. Instead of two big boxes of mounted stamps, I have one 1/2 inch binder (stamps organized by size) and a little bag of knobs/blocks.

Stamp credit: Curtis Uyeda Collection

Bead Storage

I recently purchased a set of small beads. The case it came in was cute, but not very functional. Every time I opened it, beads would spill into neighboring compartments or flip out of the container. I was also afraid that I might knock it over and hundreds of beads would scatter madly across the tiled floor.

I filled floral water tubes (similar to this) with beads. Now I can easily choose from a rainbow of colors without having to break out the vacuum cleaner.

Organizing Homework

Hi, today I'm over at About Multiples, the official blog of Gemini Crickets Parents of Multiples Club of Silicon Valley, with some advice on organizing school paperwork.

When my son was in Kindergarten, homework was easy to manage. Most of the week's assignments fit on one page. To prepare for first grade, I decided to use an accordion folder to organize his paperwork... (read more about managing homework for multiples, here).