See the tutorials below!
DIY Bunny Party Hats
Disclosure: This post is brought to you by the Tic Tac® brand. I received compensation to write this post through the Tic Tac Pack Program; however, all opinions expressed are my own.
As you know, it’s my personal belief that all holidays deserve a party, and Easter is no exception. That’s why I came up with this DIY bunny party hat to celebrate in true bunny style. They’re perfect for an Easter hunt or sporting at the dinner table. No big pink bunny costumes (a la a certain Christmas movie) needed! See below for the full tutorial.
I used the new Bunny Burst Tic Tac® mints to inspire my color palette for the bunny hats. They are a blend of artificially flavored green apple and grape mints and, of course, I ate a few along the way, to really get into the spirit. These little mints were the perfect confetti accessory for the table scene. Wouldn’t they be cute left out as a surprise for your guests mixed with the party hats?!
DIY Easter bunny party hats
Materials:
- cardstock in various pastel shades
- scissors
- permanent marker
- glue dots
- craft knife
- twine
- Easter Bunny Party Hat Template
Instructions:
- Make the party hats with this template. Any classic party hat template will do.
- Cut out eyes and noses for the bunny with simple circles and triangles and long thin pieces for the whiskers.
- Attach the eyes and nose with glue dots.
- Draw in a simple mouth with your permanent marker.
- Cut slits in the side of the hat with your craft knife.
- Cut out ears and fold at the bottom about ¼” up.
- Insert the ears and secure with tape inside.
- Attach twine to the sides of the inside of the hat to tie around the head. Secure with tape.
Voila!
Enjoy the Easter party with your new bunny hats!
This post was sponsored by the Tic Tac® brand. All content and opinions are my own! Thank you for supporting the sponsors that keep The House That Lars Built running!
For more Easter craft ideas and inspiration, take a look at the Lars Easter Pinterest board.
5 Mom and Baby Halloween Costumes
Halloween is fast approaching and there are few holidays I like more! Spooky and creepy may not seem like the name of the game here at Lars, but we love to go all out! What’s more fun than dressing up?! You’ve probably heard that I’m pregnant (yeah, that’s the bump under my dresses, folks), 24 weeks to be exact, so naturally, we have babies on the brain here! We’ve teamed up with Solly Baby this Halloween season to create 5 amazing mom and baby halloween costumes along with their daily giveaways on Instagram! Each costume has a component for the mom and then a way to dress up the Solly wrap in a coordinating costume for their baby. We are so thrilled with how they all turned out! And even if you don’t have a babe to tote around on Halloween, these costumes would still be amazing! I’m having a hard time choosing, but I think I’m going to go with the Russian doll costume myself! But who knows! They’re all so good!
Check out all the looks and start planning your costume! I’d love to know which one is your favorite?
DIY toilet paper roll candy garland
DIY toilet paper roll candy garland
ASTROBRIGHTS®, who I woked with on my paper plants, asked me how I would “colorize your Halloween” and I said, “with toilet paper candy garlands” of course! It’s become my belief that every party needs candy and every room needs a candy garland. It just makes the world a brighter, sweeter place! I based the concept on these candy lights that my mom used to make for our house for Christmas. I’ve been saving toilet paper rolls for over a year now (what? You don’t?!) so this was the perfect time to put them to use. It makes it so easy to cover with their vibrant color papers and a layer of cellophane. Easy squeezy!
See the full tutorial below!
Halloween Dinner Party Menu
I gave a sneak peek of the delicious dinner party menu for our Halloween vanitas party (read more about the party here) with the printable menu cards and guys, you will want to bookmark/pin/note/dream about this menu. It’s beyond. If you remember from the Midsummer party, we partnered up with the girls from Ramblin Rose Cafe who created this out of this world menu. These girls have a knack for making delicious, healthy food that’s also gorgeous. And they have graciously provided all the recipes for you. SCORE! You’ll get dishes like:
Roasted root vegetables with honey orange vinaigrette
Autumn Harvest Board
Roasted Garlic and Cauliflower soup
plus a delicious beverage to wash it all down. This dinner party menu is autumnal, flavorful, and beautiful! Go ahead, bookmark!
Food and food styling by Ramblin Rose Cafe
Art directed by Brittany Jepsen
See the full recipes below
Dinner party menu: Roasted Root Vegetables with honey orange vinaigrette
- Red beets, golden beets, rutabaga, black turnip, parsnip, and rainbow carrots
- Olive oil
- 1 c. black rice
- 2 c. water
- 1/4 inch slice of ginger
- 1 star anise
- Big pinch of sea salt
- Cracked black pepper
- 1/2 c. hazelnuts, toasted and roughly chopped (for garnish)
Honey Orange Vinaigrette
- 1 orange, juiced
- 1 lemon, juiced
- 1/4 c. honey wine vinegar
- 1/2 c. extra virgin olive oil
- Sea salt
- Cracked black pepper
- For the vinaigrette: place everything in a jar with a tight lid and shake to combine. Taste and adjust with sea salt and cracked pepper to your liking.
- Rinse black rice in a strainer under running water to get rid of excess starch. Place rinsed rice, water, ginger, star anise, salt, and pepper in a pot with a lid. Bring to a boil, then turn down to a gentle simmer. Cook for 25030 minutes until water is absorbed and rice is tender. Remove from heat and leave lid for 15 minutes. Fluff with a fork, remove star anise and ginger.
- Meanwhile, rustically cut a variety of root vegetables. Toss in olive oil, sea salt, and cracked pepper. Place on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Roast at 400 degrees until tender (about 30 minutes).
- Toss rice in vinaigrette and pour onto platter. When vegetables are done roasting, arrange on top and finish with extra vinaigrette, sea salt, cracked pepper, and toasted hazelnuts.
Dinner party menu: Roasted Garlic and Cauliflower Soup
- 2 heads of cauliflower
- 1 bulb of garlic
- 1 onion
- Olive oil
- Veggie stock to cover
- Sea salt
- Cracked pepper
- Yogurt
- Chili oil
Chili oil
- 1/2 c. olive oil
- 2 tbsp. red chili flakes
- In a small pot, bring oil and chili flakes to a simmer, then turn off and let steep for about 30 minutes to let the chili infuse into the oil.
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees
- Cut the top of the garlic bulb off, drizzle with olive oil, and wrap it in tin foil. Roast the whole garlic bulb until soft and golden.
- Roughly chop onion and sauté in olive oil until translucent. Season with sea salt and cracked pepper. Roughly chop cauliflower. Add to onions and season again. When cauliflower is tender and golden, cover with veggie stock.
- Squeeze the roasted garlic out of the papery bulb into the soup pot. Blend soup with an immersion blender or high speed blender until smooth. Taste and season with more sea salt and cracked pepper if necessary.
- Finish with the chili oil and a drizzle of yogurt
Dinner party menu: Autumn Harvest Board
- Artisan bread, torn
- Artisan cheeses– we used Humboldt Fog Goat Cheese, Teahhive Cheddar Cheese, and a French Roquefort Blue Cheese
- Olives
- Orchard fruit, sliced
- Figs, cut in half
- Pomegranate, deseeded
- Butter and flakey sea salt
- Honeycomb
- Spicy dark chocolate, broken into pieces
- Big wooden board to serve on
A few pointers when arranging a harvest board:
- Use a big enough board. Better to have the contrast of wood showing than all the good stuff rolling off.
- Place the cheeses and bread down first. Everything else can be scattered around and made to fit.
- Keep each ingredient clumped somewhat together, to keep it easier to dish from.
- If using honeycomb, place on the board at the edge. The honey starts to seep out of the comb as soon as it is cut.
Dinner party menu: Pomegranate Ginger Elixir
Equal parts:
- Pomegranate juice (chilled)
- Ginger beer (chilled)
- Combine in individual glasses or make a big pitcher. Serve chilled.
These foods look *almost* too gorgeous to eat. To complete the dinner party menu, try our vanilla bean skull cake for dessert! And to go along with these dinner party recipes, check out our full post about how to throw a beautiful and spooky Halloween party!
DIY Rainbow Pumpkins
We originally made these DIY Rainbow Pumpkins in 2017, and since then they have inspired even more rainbow pumpkin projects like this arch, and this paper pumpkin tablescape.
When it comes to Autumn and Halloween decor, I always have a difficult time deciding which direction I want to take it. Do you go traditional with black and orange and the typical bats and witch hats? Or maybe all white with plenty of skeletons and ghosts? Honestly, I’ll probably switch it up every year. But is it any surprise that I wanted to go rainbow? I love those front porches that are overflowing with pumpkins and I thought would look so fun in a beautiful muted rainbow palette. It’s a simple concept, yet the execution looks so stunning! These DIY Rainbow Pumpkins are the perfect way to adorn your porch for October and November!
Let’s paint the pumpkins rainbow!
DIY Rainbow Pumpkins
Materials:
- Various sized pumpkins
- House and acrylic paints in a rainbow of colors (palette below)
- Paintbrushes
- Masking tape to mark off the stems
Instructions:
- Wipe down your pumpkins with a wet rag to remove any dirt or grime and let dry
- Tape off the stem to avoid getting paint splatters on it.
- Paint 1-2 pumpkins each color of the attached color palette. Let dry
- Arrange on your front porch in rainbow order!
TIP: The paint will easily chip/peel off the pumpkin, so if you’d like them to last longer, feel free to coat them with a sealant.
Other DIY Rainbow Pumpkin Projects
Use this rainbow look everywhere this holiday season to tie it all together! If you want an even bolder rainbow pumpkin display and one that you can reuse in the future, check out our DIY rainbow pumpkin arch! For that project we used foam pumpkins so we can enjoy it for plenty of years to come. Or for our most simple and sustainable rainbow pumpkin project yet, you can make them out of paper for your holiday dinner party. You can find that tutorial here!
For more rainbow inspiration and DIY projects, check out our Pinterest here!
2 showstopper Halloween costumes made from everyday supplies
We’re finishing up our Halloween series with Bath and Body Works (you can see the first one here and the second one here) with 2 showstopper costumes made from everyday materials. We were inspired by Tahitian Island Dream to create a mermaid and Warm Vanilla Sugar to create a gilded mummy. By “showstopper” we mean that these ones will take a bit more time, but the results are so so worth it, no?! We had every intention of going the traditional fabric/sea shell route, but after seeing how much fun it was to create the unicorn, hippies, and Marie Antoinette costumes, I wanted to get my hands on some non-traditional items again. Can you guess what we made the mermaid costume out of?
If You Give a Mouse a Cookie Costumes
If You Give a Mouse a Cookie Costumes
We have two more costumes from children’s illustrated books to share with you and “If You Give a Mouse A Cookie,” by Laura Numeroff and illustrated by Felicia Bond, is an absolute must!
The story goes like this: A little boy named Oliver gives a cookie to a mouse named Quinley. He starts requesting items to help his cookie-eating experience – a glass of milk, a mirror (to prevent a milk mustache), and a broom (to wipe away his hair). He takes a nap afterward, only to look at the fridge and become hungry for a cookie again.
This beloved children’s book about a hungry little mouse is fun for both kids and adults to read and if you haven’t read it yet, put it on your storytime list! I mean, what’s more darling than a mouse in overalls and cookies!? We knew this was going to make the perfect Halloween costume so we got brainstorming.
Here’s an Overview of the Costumes:
The obvious first costume from the book was the mouse. First, we need some mouse ears.
- See here to make the mouse‘s ears (here’s the template)
- And to complete the mouse’s outfit: a white shirt (we used this one), overalls (we used these ones)
Once the ears and overalls came together, we added a little bit of face paint, and voila! The cutest mouse you’ve ever seen!
Next, we debated between a glass of milk and a cookie. The cookie was too cute to pass on so it was the clear winner!
To Make the Cookie Costume:
This costume wouldn’t be complete without a cookie to compliment it! We want that cookie to be on full display!
- We used this white top and white leggings
Materials: Two pieces of large brown cardboard, ribbons, black or brown acrylic paint, pencil, box cutter, paintbrush, stapler
- Draw a circle with your pencil according to the size of your child. We did a 2′ diameter circle.
- Draw over the circle again with wavy lines so that the lines look uneven. This will make it feel more like a naturally shaped cookie.
- Cut out two of these shapes.
- Paint uneven, brushy circles resembling chocolate chips onto the cardboard.
- Staple a ribbon from the inner side of the cardboard to the other cookie piece like a sandwich board. Repeat to the other circle.
- Wear white and you’re good to go!
Though we dressed another child as the cookie, it would also be perfect for an adult or sibling.
And if that wasn’t enough, we included a cookie treat bag to complete the picture.
To Make the Cookie Treat Bag:
Materials: 2 pieces of tan felt, brown or black felt, scissors, cotton ribbing – 2′ in length, glue gun, template
- Cut out two circles to form a cookie shape out of the tan felt.
- Cut out about 7-10 small pieces of black or dark brown uneven circles and glue them to the tan felt.
- Glue the ribbing (or sew) to one inside of the cookie and then to the opposite side.
- Glue the two cookies together, leaving a gap at the top of the bag big enough for little hands to go in and out.
Donzo! You’ll have to read the full book to find out the hilarious cycle of requests the mouse has and maybe come up with even more costume ideas (ie straw, refrigerator, etc…)
Photography by Lindsay Graviet | Crafting by Ashley Isenhour | Clothes provided by Primary
4 Easy Iron-On Cricut Costumes
Easy Iron-On Cricut Costumes
Hallelujah! We’ve joined forces with Cricut to create four easy iron-on costumes: beehive, green house, constellation, and picnic inspired ! Each adorable Halloween Cricut costume can be thrown together in less than an hour! The iron-on vinyl decals can be easily cut out with the new Cricut Maker and ironed on with the Easy Press! Bonus? You probably already have something in your closet that you can easily transform into one of these costumes!
Check out all of the iron-on costumes!
2 Frida Kahlo costumes
I’ve always wanted to host a “come dressed as your favorite artist” party and I found Halloween the perfect opportunity to do so. We invited everyone to come dressed as their favorite tortured artist for our Halloween party. Some of the costumes we’ll show you are a bit more “tortured” than others, but all are easy to make from your existing closets with a little help from the fabric and craft stores.
A must for any Tortured Artist party is Frida Kahlo, who, as a person, was quite a tortured soul. We decided to go with her double self-portrait, The 2 Fridas, which is a great choice if you’re wanting a costume for two people. A lot of the costume came from my own closet, but you know me, I like my clothes bright and waistband-less.
To give you a bit of background, this particular painting depicts Frida in the midst of her divorce from Diego Rivera. She left the two hearts exposed showing one broken and the other hole, the one that Diego loved. She depicted surgical pincers to show that she was cutting off the emotional ties.
Here’s how to get the look:
- Mexican dress (I got ours from Flor de Luz)
- Embroidered skirt (this one is from Asos)
- Yellow floral top (from Asos)
- Bright tights (here are some similar tights and a ton of color options here)
- We used clogs and shoes from our house (like the pair from Lotta from Stockholm)
- Monkey (ours is from here)
- Yarn
- Floral head piece (see tutorial below)
- Embroidered anatomical heart (see tutorial below)
Photography by Alpha Smoot
Hair by Aubrey Nelson
Make up by Rubie Huber
Crafting by Ashley Isenhour
Art directed by Brittany Jepsen
See the full tutorial below
Materials: 3 silk flowers (1 large and 2 medium), 6 silk leaves, headband, black ribbon or fabric strip, scissors, hot glue gun, pliers with wire cutting section (depending on your flowers)
Step 1: Cut 3 silk flowers and 6 silk leaves from flower stems. If your flowers have wire in the stems you’ll want to use wire cutters for this. Leave about 2 inches of stem on the flowers to make gluing the flowers to the headband easier.
Step 2: Cut about 1.5″ of ribbon or fabric strip. Fold piece over one end of the headband and hot glue it into place. Glue end of ribbon to other end of headband. Start wrapping ribbon tightly around headband and add a bit of hot glue to secure ribbon to headband. Continue wrapping until headband is completely covered. Cut end of ribbon and hot glue end to headband.
Step 3: Hot glue 2 leaves (one on either side) to back of large flower. Squirt hot glue on middle of headband. Attach large flower (angling flower forward) and hold in place until hot glue dries.
Step 4: Turn medium flower over. Bend stem to one side of flower. Hot glue 2 leaves on opposite side. Repeat with other medium flower.
Step 5: Lift right leaf of large flower up and squirt hot glue on underside of leaf and along headband. Place one of the medium flowers in this space, making sure that leaves on medium flower are pointing away from center large flower. Angle flower forward slightly while glue dries. On back side of headband hot glue stem of medium flower to back of large flower to secure. Repeat (in opposite direction) with other medium flower.
ANATOMICAL HEART by Ashley Isenhour
Materials: 1/4 yard cream or muslin fabric, embroidery needle, red embroidery thread, embroidery hoop, scissors, white glue, scotch tape, water soluble fabric marker (like this), template (get it here)
Step 1: Print out embroidery pattern. Cut piece of fabric large enough to fit your embroidery hoop. Tape pattern to a sun-lit window. Tape fabric over pattern and trace heart onto fabric with a water soluble fabric marker.
Step 2: Stretch fabric in embroidery hoop. Stitch over heart pattern using a chain stitch (see a great tutorial here) or backstitch. (Good tutorials here.
Step 3: Rinse fabric with water to erase fabric marker. Allow to dry.
Step 4: Trim fabric about 1/4″ all the way around outline of heart. Dab a tiny bit of white glue around edge of fabric and let dry. This will prevent fraying.
Note: If you don’t want to embroider, you can paint or draw it with a marker.
MAKE UP TUTORIAL by Rubie Huber
These two girlies were fun to work with, and I was able to express my love for one of the most beautiful female artists with their make up.
Of course the main job with Frida was the eyebrows. Don’t be afraid to go crazy here! You gotta go even bolder than your boldest brow to really get that Frida look.
First brush your brows up and out and every which way you can to make them fuller and more prominant. I used some eyebrow gel (get it here) to set them at all sorts of angles. Darken them out with dark brown matte eyeshadow. To make them more intense. Spread the same dark eyeshadow between the brows. Using a super thin tiny brush (this one worked great) get the same eyeshadow wet with water and draw a few lines in between the brows and all over the edges.
Keep the rest of the face really clean, only adding nude cream eyeshadow and black mascara.
For the cheeks I used a deep liquid blush more on the red or purple side than the pink; Frida was all about the rich reds. Blend it out on the apples of the cheeks.
You need a deep oxblood red to get the Frida drama. I love the Kate Moss line by Rimmel London #11 (from here). It’s intense.
Finish off the look with a little bronzing around the edges of the face with a non shimmery bronzer.
DIY Classic Halloween Face Masks
Easy DIY Halloween Face Masks
Even if you’re putting on a costume to hang out at home and watch the Sanderson sisters’ hijinks, our DIY Halloween Face Masks Tutorial will scratch that creative itch. And, as everyone knows, I don’t believe costumes are just for one night in October. Where’s the fun in that? Yep, you can reuse these masks for playtime, too (or for wearing when you leave your house for the first time in months to take out the trash and you don’t want your neighbors to see you…).
One note: I already LOVED Portland Garment Factory’s plain cotton face masks, because I’ve found them to be the best shape for breathability–you don’t suck the fabric in and out! So, working with them on this project was really a practical choice. And a bonus that you can have so much fun with them!
How to Make DIY Halloween Face Masks
You will need:
- Scissors
- Face paint for the areas around the eyes
- Sewing machine + thread to match the mask fabric
- OR plain cotton face masks (again, we used the Artst set from Portland Garment Factory)
- Iron + ironing board
Classic Halloween Face Masks
We chose some classic Halloween costume ideas to show just how easy to is to transform the iconic into a practical face mask/costume. You can choose from a jack-o-lantern, mummy, a Day of the Dead skeleton.
Jack-O-Lantern Mask
Materials
- Orange fabric or orange face mask here
- Mask template
- Black oversized ric rac
- Black paint
- Jack-o-lantern template
Instructions:
- Sew your orange face mask
- Trace your template onto the mask
- You can see that I first was going to embroidery it, but I decided to paint it (easier and faster!). However you’d like to do it!
- Sew or glue the ric rac into the face mask (don’t you love how it mimics the mouth?!?!)
Mummy
This DIY Mummy costume requires no toilet paper, so don’t worry about making a dent in your 2020 stash.
Materials
- Plain muslin mask (from Portland Factory’s Artist pack)
- Cheese cloth
- Muslin fabric
- Quarter inch cotton lace
- Stretchy white netting
- Gold and tan ribbon
- Earl Grey Tea
- Hot glue
- Pins
- Gold Thread
- Metallic Gold Thread
Instructions
-
- Cut muslin fabric into a 8 by 8 inch square.
- Tear strips of muslin fabric into varying strips of ½ inch to 1 inch.
- Cut sections of cheese cloth into similar sized strips
- Fill a bowl with hot water and brew four tea bags.
- Submerge the strips of fabric in the tea, dying them until desired color is reached.
- Remove strips and rinse, the color will lighten slightly after rinsed and dried.
- Leave strips to dry, you can speed the process with a hairdryer and straightener on a low setting.
- Trim along the long edge of the gold ribbon and fray the edge. Cut into similar length sections.
- Cut the stretchy netting into three strips and form into a thin braid.
- Layer the fabric strips and ribbons in a criss-cross pattern across the mask. Use the pins to keep them in place.
- Trim excess fabric around the mask.
- Layer by layer hot glue each strip onto the mask and on to each other.
- Lightly hot glue the braid along the bottom of the mask.
- Sketch a scarab beetle onto a 1 by 1 inch piece of muslin fabric.
- Using the gold thread embroider along the pattern. Use metallic thread as an accent.
- Hot glue four strips to the back of the mask to serve as ties for the mask.
Ok, this picture I just thought was funny. I’m about 7 months pregnant and clearly my dresses aren’t wrapping around right now.
Need More Ideas?
Need some more Halloween costume ideas? Well you’ve come to the right place! Check out our Halloween archive for tons of DIY costume, party, and decor ideas.
How to win this year’s Halloween costume contest
7 Artsy and Iconic Halloween Costume Ideas
Our Favorite Face Masks
The Giving Tree Parent and Child Costumes
We’re kicking it off with a few costumes from children’s story books. And the first up, is The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein, a personal favorite. I always wanted to be a part of the story and now I can with the adult tree costume DIY and little boy costumes along with an apple trick-or-treat bag DIY. The best part is, this whole costume can be non-sewable by using a glue gun. Just be mindful if there are little hands around.