Creepy Crawly Craft Carnival

Hosted by Mayhem and Moxie as part of a Flipping for a FLIP giveaway week over at the awesome Angie's 7 Clown Circus.

OK, here goes:

I'm crafting challenged--or a person with crafting disabilities--or whatever the PC term is right now. Basically--I'm NO Martha Stewart.

As much as I love to see all of the sparkly, glittery, gluey, puffy-painted adorable delights created by tiny hands--I have to admit that when it comes to creativity--God must have simply left that out of my Mom DNA.

BUT!

I can follow directions.

So thank God for crafts like this:

These crafts come in kits! Not only are all of the pieces there, but there is a wonderful box with directions and pictures and everything you need to create a perfectly pre-fabricated craft that when finished makes you feel like you just painted the Sistine Chapel! Albeit--a color-by-numbers version of said chapel maybe, but still, these awesome little foam-rubber kits do wonders for my craft-esteem and are available at most craft stores I've been brave enough to walk in to. I love them!

In addition to following directions from pre-made kits I can also copy-cat! That's right--if I see a picture in a magazine I can re-create it.

I'm so talented, right?

Actually, with this craft, I did have to dig deep for a little creativity because I didn't have a stand to put the bouquet in--the craft was simply to take Sophie on a walk to collect pretty leaves. That was easy and fun too. Then all we have to do was assemble a bundle with some pipe cleaners around the stems and stand them up for some beautiful, homemade, fall leaf centerpieces.

The 'standing-up' got tricky because I only have giant vases for real flowers, not teeny-tiny ones for leaf flowers. So, I got out last years leftover play-doh Easter eggs and simply took half an egg with half the play-doh on top and stuck the stems in. It totally worked for almost 2 hours--which gave us enough time to enjoy a delightful dinner--before I promptly threw them in the garbage.

I'm pretty sure Sophie didn't even notice. At least she didn't say anything!

Now, for some of my favorite stuff. I've plugged PICNIK on my blog before and I just have to say if you want some fun way to kill a million hours--go head over there to 'play' with your pictures. This website is one of my favorites--I've already spent mega tons of time over there. This year they have created some really fun ways to spook-up your photographs--

This is so totally gruesome, and I can't think of a better (or any other) place than my blog to post these pictures. I love the look on little Sammy's face--and took total advantage of it to really make Sophie look as scary as possible.

Here's another one:

Funny little look on his face made turning him into a Shrek look alike very easy!

EWWW--Gross isn't it?
I can't imagine when or where I would actually use these pictures, but I think someday this will be really fun for my kids to play tricks on people.

Gotta love Halloween though. I know I do!

But, I recently mentioned on Angie's comments that my Halloween mojo is missing.

Unfortunately this year, the only thing I seem to be loving is the candy. In honor of this carnival Sophie and I attempted a new kit craft yesterday, and well, I'll just let the pictures do the talking.

The look on Sophie's face here tells it all.

Forget it! Let's just play with the glue!
So, we crashed and burned this year with the Halloween crafts. THANK GOD for the candy! And the giant tin of popcorn! And drinking water out of the sparkly glass to make it fun. Yeah-we were really rockin' the house yesterday! Maybe next year I'll find my spooky spirit and make up for my lack of ghoulish glitz this year.

OK, I'm done for today. If nothing else though, blogging this week is totally fun!!!!!!If you to join in the Crafty Carnival fun--go here. If you want to join in for a chance to FLIP with Angie and the rest of her gang go here. At least I can 'fake' my enthusiasm for this holiday by blogging a lot--AND I bump up my chances for winning a new camera--now that's something to celebrate!