Last weekend was our 13th annual Witches' Gathering! This year we went with a bat theme. Here are the batty invitations:
In keeping with the bat theme, I gave the pumpkins glittery masks. This is one of the pumpkins you watched grow previously. How exciting to see it fully formed and dressed up!
I made some paper hanging bats for outside.
They cast a spooky shadow under the lanterns at night. There will be more night photos later on. I just wanted to show you the day/night bat comparison.
We managed to find some batty treat bags. I propped one up against the new jack-o-lantern, which came from Pick 'N Save of all places. It looks cute next to its big brother.
Here's what the guests found in their treat bags. We were happy to find those Necco Batwing wafers. They're better than regular Necco wafers because they're cinnamon flavored and shaped like little bats.
We made hanging bat place cards this year. The bats are from Dollar Tree. I hot glued some ribbon to their wings and hot glued the name tags to their feet. As you can see, we did the Halloween versions of people's names again. We were inspired by the credits in the Simpson's Halloween Specials.
Here they are flying from the chandelier.
The bats were glamorized with a little nail polish. I painted their upper wings, ears and faces with different metallic colors.
I even painted their little toe nails!
We made the triple chocolate Devils Food cupcakes again and then added chocolate chips to the batter. That makes them even better! I folded some bats out of construction paper and hot glued them to floral wire. Then they could fly from the cupcakes.
I also folded some bats for decorating the drinking glasses. I got into major bat creation mode once I figured out how to do this. I cut a slit in the bat's body so it would fit on the glass.
Aren't these mini orange roses pretty? More paper bats were glittered and inserted into the roses. Some bats are also springing from the arrangement on floral wire.
Here's the dinner table all set and decorated for the party.
I ran across a super quick recipe for tortilla bats by googling "tortilla bats". Here's my search result: Tortilla Bat How-to. Sometimes I'm surprised to google some random thing and actually find a result! These could really be tortilla anything - whatever shape you have a cookie cutter of. I plan to make a bunch of different Halloween shaped tortillas for Halloween.
Making the tortilla bats was pretty simple. I just cut into a tortilla with the cookie cutter. Tortillas are fairly tough, so make sure you have a sharp cookie cutter. Then I covered the bats in olive oil and lots of salt and popped them into the oven. They baked at 375 degrees for 10 minutes. Fun, easy, and they got a lot of compliments!
Each guest had a tortilla bat garnishing their chilli.
After the chilli dinner we had the cupcakes and a flavor of ice cream that was new to me - Creamsicle! We chose it in part because it's orange. I didn't see a whole lot of Halloween ice cream flavors available this year. Come to think of it, I didn't even see pumpkin ice cream! The Creamsicle ice cream was a hit. It comes with little chunks of candy-like stuff in it.
Each guest got a little solar bobblehead pumpkin man. We were thrilled to find these at Dollar Tree. The bobbleheads get bought up pretty fast. At least at our local Dollar Tree, you better scoop them up the day they arrive or you won't get one. I love these little pumpkin men! I think they have a vintage look.
Mom and me in our witch outfits:
Me with the bat cupcakes:
You can see a bit of my earrings in that picture. They're a whopping four-and-a-half inches in length! I like big, dramatic earrings and these really fit with the bat theme.
Remember those mini bottles I witchified this year? Here they are with the larger vintage bottles. Every one of these bottles is an estate sale find. This picture might be a little confusing because it was taken against a mirror.
Part of the electric pumpkin patch:
I like how this picture turned out. It's so warm and bright.
This spooky tree was a lucky Michaels find this year! Every little glass container holds a candle, as does a space behind the tree's face.
I think this tree has such personality!
As the party went on, the moon creeped out. This is kind of a fuzzy picture, because it was kind of a fuzzy night. We had the perfect mysterious sky for the night of a Halloween party.
I set a few candles outside along with some vintage bat images I found online.
If you'd like to access that same collection of Halloween images, here's their source:
The 50+ Best Free Vintage Halloween Images from The Graphics Fairy
The images are nicely categorized, so I could go straight to the "batty costumed ladies"!
There's that baby pumpkin and his big brother again. I had some spooky noises playing from behind them.
The guests were nice enough to bring these hostess gifts: A big pumpkin spice candle, fuzzy silhouette candle holders, mango slices, little silhouette plaques, seed packets, and this sassy witch kitchen towel.
Here are those candle holders all lit up. I like how it looks like there's a sun or moon shining behind each of the images.
If you'd like to see photos from Witch Parties past, here are a few blog posts:
Welcome to the Witch Party 2012
Welcome to the Witch Party 2011
P.S. ~ My Halloween blog party is this Friday, the 25th. If you'd like to participate, please send me your costumed photo!
In keeping with the bat theme, I gave the pumpkins glittery masks. This is one of the pumpkins you watched grow previously. How exciting to see it fully formed and dressed up!
I made some paper hanging bats for outside.
They cast a spooky shadow under the lanterns at night. There will be more night photos later on. I just wanted to show you the day/night bat comparison.
We managed to find some batty treat bags. I propped one up against the new jack-o-lantern, which came from Pick 'N Save of all places. It looks cute next to its big brother.
Here's what the guests found in their treat bags. We were happy to find those Necco Batwing wafers. They're better than regular Necco wafers because they're cinnamon flavored and shaped like little bats.
We made hanging bat place cards this year. The bats are from Dollar Tree. I hot glued some ribbon to their wings and hot glued the name tags to their feet. As you can see, we did the Halloween versions of people's names again. We were inspired by the credits in the Simpson's Halloween Specials.
Here they are flying from the chandelier.
The bats were glamorized with a little nail polish. I painted their upper wings, ears and faces with different metallic colors.
I even painted their little toe nails!
We made the triple chocolate Devils Food cupcakes again and then added chocolate chips to the batter. That makes them even better! I folded some bats out of construction paper and hot glued them to floral wire. Then they could fly from the cupcakes.
I also folded some bats for decorating the drinking glasses. I got into major bat creation mode once I figured out how to do this. I cut a slit in the bat's body so it would fit on the glass.
Aren't these mini orange roses pretty? More paper bats were glittered and inserted into the roses. Some bats are also springing from the arrangement on floral wire.
Here's the dinner table all set and decorated for the party.
Making the tortilla bats was pretty simple. I just cut into a tortilla with the cookie cutter. Tortillas are fairly tough, so make sure you have a sharp cookie cutter. Then I covered the bats in olive oil and lots of salt and popped them into the oven. They baked at 375 degrees for 10 minutes. Fun, easy, and they got a lot of compliments!
Each guest had a tortilla bat garnishing their chilli.
After the chilli dinner we had the cupcakes and a flavor of ice cream that was new to me - Creamsicle! We chose it in part because it's orange. I didn't see a whole lot of Halloween ice cream flavors available this year. Come to think of it, I didn't even see pumpkin ice cream! The Creamsicle ice cream was a hit. It comes with little chunks of candy-like stuff in it.
Each guest got a little solar bobblehead pumpkin man. We were thrilled to find these at Dollar Tree. The bobbleheads get bought up pretty fast. At least at our local Dollar Tree, you better scoop them up the day they arrive or you won't get one. I love these little pumpkin men! I think they have a vintage look.
Mom and me in our witch outfits:
Me with the bat cupcakes:
You can see a bit of my earrings in that picture. They're a whopping four-and-a-half inches in length! I like big, dramatic earrings and these really fit with the bat theme.
Remember those mini bottles I witchified this year? Here they are with the larger vintage bottles. Every one of these bottles is an estate sale find. This picture might be a little confusing because it was taken against a mirror.
Part of the electric pumpkin patch:
I like how this picture turned out. It's so warm and bright.
This spooky tree was a lucky Michaels find this year! Every little glass container holds a candle, as does a space behind the tree's face.
I think this tree has such personality!
As the party went on, the moon creeped out. This is kind of a fuzzy picture, because it was kind of a fuzzy night. We had the perfect mysterious sky for the night of a Halloween party.
I set a few candles outside along with some vintage bat images I found online.
If you'd like to access that same collection of Halloween images, here's their source:
The 50+ Best Free Vintage Halloween Images from The Graphics Fairy
The images are nicely categorized, so I could go straight to the "batty costumed ladies"!
There's that baby pumpkin and his big brother again. I had some spooky noises playing from behind them.
The guests were nice enough to bring these hostess gifts: A big pumpkin spice candle, fuzzy silhouette candle holders, mango slices, little silhouette plaques, seed packets, and this sassy witch kitchen towel.
Here are those candle holders all lit up. I like how it looks like there's a sun or moon shining behind each of the images.
If you'd like to see photos from Witch Parties past, here are a few blog posts:
Welcome to the Witch Party 2012
Welcome to the Witch Party 2011
P.S. ~ My Halloween blog party is this Friday, the 25th. If you'd like to participate, please send me your costumed photo!
