I am so going to wear this to school!!!!

For Halloween, K wanted to be a pirate.  A steampunk pirate to be exact.  She needed some kind of bodice, so we decided on a leather(ish) laced waist cincher.  It took a couple of days, mostly because I had made a basket the day before and my hands were torn up: cuts, scrapes, raw all over.  I wasn't being careful and I mangled my hands.  Good thing it was black, the blood stains don't show.

36 eyelets.  K LOVED it!

This was the full costume

 The baby kitties loved it.  All swishy and ribbons galore.  She exchanged the Fez for a black cap and Quiddich goggles.  It was very cool.

For Trick or Treating, she just kept the pirate bits.

Fun was had.

My kitties have chosen their costumes.

Miss. Kitty is going to be a mandrake.



Susan is going with a more general potions theme.



Oh dear, someone seems to have changed her mind.




Silly Kitties.

The Doctor's Daughter

After much debate and many changes of mind, K decided to be the Doctor's new companion Amy Pond for Halloween. She chose the costume Amy wore in Vampires in Venice (one of two costumes Amy has worn thus far, that a young girl should wear.) The long, not pink, skirt and accessories were K's idea.

She desperately wanted Mr. Man to dress up for trunk or treat. I was going as Molly Weasley, so he was going to be Arthur, until we realized his grey hair would be ginger for quite some time if we used the red hair spray. Not an option.

Determined, K started rummaging through our closets and laying pieces out on the bed. Ten minutes later, I'd made the final piece, a burgundy bow tie, and K had made herself the Doctor's Daughter.

OK, she's been the Doctor's Daughter since birth, but this absolutely made her day.

Can you guess who we were for Halloween?

We had a wonderful Halloween this year.

Mr Man was...

...Dilbert!

K was...

...Nudge from Maximum Ride. (Yup, jeans, a tshirt, windbreaker and wings. All I had to do was paint the wings like a tauwny owl. Least time I've spent on a costume this decade.)

And I was...

...Merope! I just wore my locket and had fun watchings peoples reactions. Several people understood at first sight, several thought it was cool after I explained, and several looked at me like I had really bad fashion sense. Pretty much a normal day then. :)

The Tale of Lady Amber of Mossflower Woods

K's Halloween costumes follow a distinct pattern. Last year she was Sarah Jane Smith with a pull along K-9. The year before she was tough Ginny Weasley. One year she was Tiger Lily. Then there was Princess Leia, Jesse the Cowgirl, Sally, and of course Hermione. Do we sense a cute but tough trend? Yup, that's my girl.

This year for Halloween, K was Lady Amber, a character that appears in the Redwall Series of books by Brian Jacques.. Basically the books are about cute, little animals, that sing, play, occasionally eat under the table, with all four paws,... and fight continuously. There are 20 books in the series so far, with more in the works. K has read about 12 1/2 in the last 6 months and LOVES them! K says they are better than Harry Potter,... today. Tomorrow, she may change her mind.

K designed her costume in early October, even working out the tail attached to the belt.

The coolest thing about her costume is that it was almost exclusively made with stuff we found in the basement or yard. I crocheted the shawl from yarn I found in my stash. Just kinda made it up as I went along. (It's really very nice and warm, and I've been wearing it ever since.)

The tunic is made from a pattern based on a medieval garment found on a female body in a bog in Denmark. (Cool!) Since it was made of wool, it didn't decay too much, and it could be pieced back together. You can read about it here and here. I used this gown pattern

But left out the front gores, because K just didn't like them.

I chose this pattern because it was very easy, no curved seams, except the keyhole neckline, and because it was extremely economical when it can to fabric usage. (Makes sense really.) I was lucky enough to find 4 yards of brown cotton flannel on sale at Walmart as a remnant for 2$,... yes total, and it was just enough. Love it! The dress is so comfy, K is using it as a night gown and wants another one. In green, of course.

K designed and constructed her bag and made her sling shot from leather strips and brown peach suede we found in the basement.

Mr. Man helped her make her bow out of a crepe myrtle branch and twine. It works very well, maybe too well. I bought her 4 dowel rods for about $3.50 and and helped her collect duck feathers at the pond for her arrows. And I made her a quiver from an old shipping tube, peach suede and green fabric paint. K did the painting.

The tail was made from a heavy wire skeleton and covered with the only scrap of long fun fur left in the city. I searched everywhere and they just don't sell it anymore, except online for 20 bucks a yard. Yikes! The piece I finally found was perfect and happened to be right in my basement of all places. Just enough for a tail and one ear. I loaned K my wide leather belt and tied the top to a harness around her shoulder and we had a tail.

The only change we made was her hat. We found one picture of Lady Amber on the Redwall Wiki and decided to make the hat shown in the picture.

The hat was made from some red peach suede I found, you guessed it, in the basement, the cat's feather and a piece of jewelry to hold a feather (I'm sure it has a name ?) we found on the ground somewhere years ago.

I love the ear and you can't even tell it is pieced together from an impossibly tiny scrap of fur.

All toll, Lady Amber cost about $4.50 plus scrounged supplies. Not bad, not bad at all.

Lady Amber of Rewall

K designed her own costume this year...

Lady Amber of Redwall: warrior squirrel, archer, only one ear, lost the other in battle.

Once again, very few people know who she is is, but she's happy. The tail was pure luck and a complete and total success, it even sways when she walks. Or does the E-slide. The bow and arrows turned out to be way too functional. The arrows are now securely hot glued in their quiver.

And just for fun, long, long ago, in our very own kitchen,

I made K's Princess Leia costume 25 years to the day after my mom and I made mine

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween!

Just a few treats for the day.

I found these wonderful ping pong eyeballs at the grocery store and I just couldn't help myself. Modeled by my lovely assistant Igor...

A crochet Mad-Eye Moody Eye!

And, K's favorite hat...

It was K's idea to add the braids, so it would be like Ron's hat in POA. I've made three candy corn hats so far, and they are a big hit. We gave one to a friend of K's and she's worn it to school ever since. And for Halloween this friend is going as a "Spider nailed, goth angel, candy cornian!" Very cute!

Have a safe and Happy Halloween everyone!

My Little Mandrake is growing out of her pot... sniff...

-

K found her Mandrake costume in the closet on Sunday. She can still fit in the pot, but, she can't slide down inside and hide anymore. At least not without a bit of a struggle. She's had such fun with this costume. She and her friend V attended a Deathly Hallows release party last year at the library dressed as Mandrakes.

They spent the whole time sneaking in and out of their pot. I guess that means they are ready for dicing and stewing. Which now I think about it, is about the best description of puberty I have ever heard.

Poor little Mandrakes.

Tiny Tales of the Beedle Bard

I finally finished my entry for the HPC Shrinking Solution Challenge.

An origami version of J.K. Rowling's "Tales of the Beedle Bard."

And everyone can have one! I've made pdf files of the design templates and a video to show how to cut and fold. I'll post them next week.

Our Tin Dog.

.

Last Halloween, K wanted to be Sara Jane Smith, one of Doctor Who's companions. If you don't know who Doctor Who could possibly be, and you live in the U.S., it's not surprising. A quick stop by the official BBC Doctor Who site, http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/, should do the trick.

(WARNING: Doctor Who is highly addictive and really entertaining, especially if you are either 8 years old or in graduate school (not much difference really.) Watching Doctor Who, especially the Pertwee years, could result in odd desires to speak with lispy british accents and wear velvet dinner jackets with frilly collars. The Baker years can induce irrational knitting urges and mild nausea, respectively. More recent episodes can generate loud squeeeeing noises from little girls who now think big ears and a british accents are just the bomb.)

We warned K that she would cause confusion and vacant stares wherever she went, but she was determined. She designed and put together her entire costume. Per instructions, I made her the cutest pair of navy blue culottes using the instructions on Vintagesewing.info, http://vintagesewing.info/, 1940 Modern Pattern Design, chapter 9. They turned out so well, I was amazed. And she looked just like Sarah Jane, right down to the boots.

Now all she needed was her mechanical friend, K9. I wasn't quite sure how we were going to put him together, but, it turns out that a bit of cardboard, paper mache, wire, PVC pipe, wood, roller skate wheels, 50 ld test fishing line, spray paint, bike reflectors, hose and an old portable phone make a rather cute little K9. I love the cat collar, K's idea, so cute. We rigged K9 to be pulled by a bit of fishing line, so it looked like he was following her around. Very good effect.

And she was a hit. Everywhere she went, K had a pack of boys following her around. Turns out even very basic renditions of mechanical dogs are downright awesome. Buttons, it's all about the buttons. The dozen or so people we met during all of Halloween, who knew who she was, recognized her immediately and were so thrilled it was funny. A very, nice, and normally very quiet librarian we had seen many times, almost climbed over her desk to get a better look. For weeks after she smiled and waved every time she saw us.

This year K wants to be Ginny Weasley. Better get to work.

Sally and Zero

.

A few years ago, K was really into Nightmare Before Christmas. So, of course, she wanted to be Sally. This was a really fun costume to make. I made her a long red yarn wig, with a bit pulled back at the ears. so she could see. Her dress was pieced together, roughly following Sally's dress in the movie, but with a bit brighter colors. Her arms and legs were covered with cotton tights, dyed blue and then cut and stitched like she was sewn together. She wore her black Mary Jane's and I made her black and white striped baggy socks.

To top the whole thing off, I made her a fleece Zero to cuddle while she was out trick or treating. Basically Zero was a soft fleece blankee with a stuffed Zero head attached.

Most people just though she was an odd Raggedy Ann with a puppy blanket. Everyone thought she was the cutest lil' thing.