Halloween 2020

Of course Halloween this year was different for all of us, but with it being Jack's second Halloween and my sister's birthday, we still wanted to make it fun!

I kept wracking my brain for the best Halloween costume for Jack. For his first Halloween he worse the cutest first Halloween outfit from Carter's, which they have a new version of every year. Then we took a photo of him wearing a cute pumpkin costume that we had actually gotten for Scout's first Halloween (similar to this one). Finally, I thought of the perfect costume.

When my sister was little, my mom made her the cutest pumpkin costume out of some old fabric my grandma had. She even made a sweet little hat to match. My sister, brother, and I all wore this costume when we were little and, being rather sentimental and having a great love for traditions, I knew this would be the perfect costume for his second Halloween.

As I said above, Halloween is also my sister's birthday and I wanted to make it as special for her during this crazy COVID-year as she made mine in April (when we all thought this would be short-lived). Plus, my parents were out of town to see my grandfather, so it would just be our family, her, and our grandmother.

The week leading up to Halloween Jack and I had made some cute little ghost and orange and black paper chain crafts and I decided I wanted to make some other Halloween decorations to decorate for Halloween and my sister's birthday. So, I stayed up late the night before Halloween (Hallows Eve?) and cut out little bats and pumpkins in addition to the ghosts and made another super long paper chain. I hung the ghosts, pumpkins, and bats from the ceiling using black thread, hung the long paper chain in the doorway to the dining room and hung the other paper chain on the wall with a Happy Birthday banner as well.

On the morning of Halloween I actually went grocery shopping (for the first time since March!) to get a few more things for the day. When I got back I put together a little spread of lunch meat, cheese, lettuce, and the most delicious brioche buns from Vermont Bread Company as well as some chips for lunch. My grandma and sister arrived just as it was time for Jack to go down for his nap, so we had lunch and my sister put on the creepiest Disney Channel movie ever, Don't Look Under the Bed (do you remember how creepy that one is?!) while I quickly got ready for the day and made her cake.

I threw it back to our childhood and made my sister a dessert called Ghosts in the Graveyard, which my mom made for many of her birthdays. It's super cute, very easy to make, and so yummy!

While Jack napped, I also packaged up a bunch of snacks for him in Ziploc bags for him to trick-or-treat for.

*I later decided Jack wasn't quite ready for fruit snacks, so my husband and I have been eating them :)

Once Jack woke up from his nap, we got our family Halloween costume on! As I said above, I planned to dress Jack in our old pumpkin costume. And initially I was going to just stick some jack-o-lantern faces on some old orange shirts my husband and I had. But last minute, I decided I wanted to make our costumes (really my costume) a little more fun. So, on Thursday night I was scrolling through Pinterest and kept seeing all these cute costumes for little girls of tulle dresses or tutus with a jack-o-lantern face and I got inspired to make my own tulle skirt and add a jack-o-lantern face to it. I ended up finding tulle by the yard on sale a Joann Fabrics and ordered a few yards of orange tulle and some thick orange ribbon to pickup the following day. I also ordered a plain orange shirt for Jon to pick from Walmart as well.

(Jack's Halloween pajamas)

On Friday Jack didn't take his normal nap, so I decided to get him in the car, hoping he'd nap, and drive the hour to pickup my craft supplies at Joann Fabrics and Walmart. That night I cut out jack-o-lantern faces from some black felt I had and hot glued them to my husband's shirt and my skirt. Rather than having to buy a ton of tulle and fabric to make a full on skirt, I just decided to layer the orange tulle over a pink tulle skirt I already had. I literally just tucked the tulle into my skirt and tied the ribbon over it, added the jack-o-lantern face, and I love how it turned out! I also made a pumpkin headband for myself using orange and green felt I already had as well as the ribbon I bought. Finally, I tied Scout's first Halloween costume to her using the ribbon, and just like that, we had a super cute pumpkin family costume for less than $10!

After taking a few photos outside, we headed back inside and prepared to trick-or-treat. Due to the pandemic and the fact that Jack is only 1, we chose not to go trick-or-treating to other houses. But we did trick-or-treat in the house. We lit our jack-o-lanterns and placed them in front of different doors in the house and Jack went to each door to get treats from each of us. It was so cute and fun!

Then it was time to make dinner. My sister requested my chicken carbonara (she would want me to tell you that it's not actually carbonara, but it is really good!) so my husband and I made that while Jack played with my sister and grandma and got into some of his treats.

We had a yummy dinner of chicken carbonara and green beans sautéed with garlic and bacon, enjoyed our Ghosts in the Graveyard, and gave my sister he gift and card. Then she helped me give Jack and bath and I put him in his skeleton pajamas that she got him and we got a few cute pictures.

Though it wasn't the usual Halloween and birthday festivities, we had such a fun day! How did you celebrate your Halloween this year?