Getting ready for a howling Halloween party this year? Spruce up your party this year with some icky, but yummy party food. Here are some fun food ideas for your ghostly Halloween party. These are so over-the-top-simple. It’s all in the name, I guess. The names are gross, so chances are, the kids will love them! Enjoy!
Snot Cubes
Refrigerate yellow and green Jello (any flavors) in ice cube trays. Serve chilled.
Worms In Snot
Make snot cubes, as directed above, out of Jello. Insert gummy worms in each cube of Jello then refrigerate. Serve chilled.
Bad Apples
Using a small, sharp knife cut a small, round hole in one side of the top of an apple. Insert a gummy worm inside the hole. Create display of “bad apples” in a wooden bucket.
Monster Mash
In a large bowl, combine the following ingredients:
* 10 cups popcorn
* 1 pound plain M&Mís
* 1-14 oz. jar dry roasted peanuts
* 1 cup raisins (optional)
* 1 cup Reese’s pieces (found in baking isle by chocolate chips)
Bowl of Brains
Scramble several eggs. To get the gray brain color, mix in green, red, and blue food coloring as you beat the eggs before cooking them.
Buggy Ice Cubes
Insert gummy worms or raisins (for bugs) in ice trays with water and freeze. Insert frozen buggy ice cubes in your bowl of party punch.
Over the weekend, my daughter asked me where Halloween came from. I thought I knew the basics that it was the day before All Souls Day but didn’t want to give her a definitive answer until I had done my research. It’s amazing how we go through life and never think about why we celebrate the days we do. So here’s the summation of my “Where Did Halloween Come From” research and I have to admit, I didn’t really know most of this.
Halloween is a traditional celebration held on October 31st.
Halloween began as an ancient Celtic festival in Great Britain and Ireland, and has survived most strongly among Irish, Scottish and Welsh communities. Immigrants from these communities carried the tradition to North America where it has gained in popularity. In turn, as part of American pop culture, Halloween has spread in popularity to most corners of the English speaking western world, and increasingly into Western Europe in recent times.
Originally Halloween was a pagan festival, around the idea of linking the living with the dead, when contact became possible between the spirits and the physical world, and magical things were more likely to happen. Like most pagan festivals, long ago it was absorbed into the festivals of the expanding Christian church, and became associated with All Hallows Day, or All Saints Day, which eventually fell on November 1 under the Gregorian calendar. A vigil for the festival was held on All Hallows Evening on October 31. “All Hallows Evening” became “Hallowe’en” and later the “Halloween” we know today.
The celebration of Halloween survived most strongly in Ireland. It was an end of summer festival, and was often celebrated in each community with a bonfire to ward off the evil spirits. Children would go from door to door in disguise as creatures from the underworld to collect treats, mainly fruit and nuts for the festivities. These were used for playing traditional games like eating an apple on a string or bobbing for apples and other gifts in a basin of water, without using your hands. Salt might be sprinkled on the visiting children to ward off evil spirits. Carving turnips as ghoulish faces to hold candles became a popular part of the festival, which has been adapted to carving pumpkins in America.
The trick aspect to trick or treating as it emerged in North America seems to have more obscure origins. It may be a merging of the collection of treats with another separate old tradition, especially in Ireland, where children would sometimes engage in secretive mischief at Halloween. The original intention was for the activities of mischievous Halloween spirits to be blamed. Usually the mischief consisted of playing some minor or witty tricks on some adults – often the less popular ones – things like moving or hiding everyday items during Halloween night.
In times past a refusal to give something when requested during trick or treating may have resulted in some prank, which was not always carried out in a spirit of good fun. Tossing eggs or flour at the house, or soaping windows, were common pranks. In most places today the trick aspect of trick or treating now survives more as a ritual than any real threat.
In Scotland and England the tradition of singing or other entertainment in return for the gifts collected was more common than the threat of a trick if nothing was given.
I wasn’t really sure of my expectations for last night’s Hannah Montana concert, but it was fantastic! And yes, there were a bunch of girls dressed in their Hannah Montana Halloween Costumes, but that didn’t distract at all from the caliber of show that this was.
Billy Ray, Miley’s dad, was there, cheering his little girl on from the sound booth. Miley had at least 10-12 costume changes, her voice sounded incredible and she’s really a doll.
The kids are off school on Monday so we’re having an impromptu Pumpkin Painting party with a group of second graders, a few kindergartners and one highly artistic seventh grader. I should start laying the newspaper out on the table now, huh?
Hannah Montana Concert and Hannah Montana Halloween Costumes? Okay, it sounds like one doesn’t have anything to do with the other. But they actually do. Apparently, being Hannah Montana this year for Halloween is all the rage. Unfortunately for us, my daughter and I were about a year ahead of the curve because she was (or wanted to be) Hannah Montana last year for Halloween. My husband went nuts searching for a long blonde wig. We had the costume, just needed the wig. He found it and even made her a custom guitar strap with “Hannah Montana” printed on it.
She wore it to her school’s “Trunk or Treat” and she said every kid came up to her asking (in that voice, you know the one), “what are YOU supposed to be?” Well, she was mortified, because the one thing you don’t want to have to deal with on Halloween is for everyone to NOT know what you’re costume is!
So I promised her we would never make up a costume where kids had to ask what she was. For Halloween night, she ended up being a cat, a really cute cat. But I just know this year at Trunk or Treat, there are going to be 50 Hannah Montanas running around. I guess it’s a good thing that we were ahead of our time.
So tonight, yes tonight, is the real deal. Tonight is the first night of the real Hannah Montana concert tour and my husband and I are taking our girls (they’re 7 and 5 years old). The girls are beyond excited. We’ve been listening to her CD all week and they know every word.
So my Halloween thought for the day is this: No matter how cool or cute a costume idea is, if you believe that someone may have to ask “what are YOU supposed to be”, come up with a different costume. It’ll make your child feel horrible. Better to be something simple like a bunch of grapes or a cat then to put a ton of time, effort and money into an idea that no one will recognize.
I just finished an update to Easy Pumpkin Painting and added four brand new, very cool designs. Here’s a little preview, but the step-by-step photo instructions are included in Easy Pumpkin Painting. Breaking down the designs in a step-by-step format makes the process so easy a first grader can paint their first pumpkin with huge success.
If you’re into Pumpkin Painting, then let me tell you that Face Painting will come as naturally to you as brushing your teeth. I’ve just updated my site at Easy Face Painting with a bunch of new articles and tips about Halloween Face Painting, Face Painting Supplies, where to find Free Face Painting Ideas and a ton of other time and money-saving ideas.
You can find all the articles listed here.
Should you decide to use Face Painting as part of a Halloween costume this year, snap some photos and send them to me. I’d love to post them on the site!