Hey, it's Halloween! Time to make the costumes!
Oscar wanted to be Harry Potter. I can only swing 2 costumes these days, so we happily purchased a HP Quidditch Robe and Goggles from Amazon. (Last night, I wore the goggles while slicing up 2 pounds of onions for soup. TOTALLY worth the purchase.)
Arlo wanted to be Gamera. I've done Kaiju costumes before (Oscar was Biolonte a couple of years ago) but the shell was going to be a problem.
The Goose wanted to be Periwinkle, Tinker Belle's newfound sister. I could have bought a regular costume, but I wanted to try and do the velvety soft sculpture leaves that make up her outfit.
First step: my yearly shopping jaunt to Dharma Trading. I've been buying clothing blanks (white clothing sewn with cotton thread) and dyes from them since my camp counselor days. They consistently sell excellent products, supply amazing instructions online and have pitch perfect customer service. I could probably have spent $60 on two store bought costumes, but instead I spent $60 on clothing, fabric and dying supplies. (I had a great stash of dying supplies built up over 5-6 years in NJ, but I got rid of them on Freecycle before the move.)
First step: two dye baths: olive drab for Gamera, turquoise for Periwinkle. Gamera had a hoodie, leggings, a length of jersey fabric for facial features, tails, and claws. Periwinkle needed a length of cotton velveteen for her overdress of leaves and leggings. I also dyed two canvas bags for their trick or treat bags to match.
I don't have pictures of the results but they came out beautifully.
My next step was to over dye & tie dye Gamera's fabric and clothes with black dye to get a lizard skin effect. I kept out a bit for a breast plate.
A couple days later. I've sculpted out Gamera's brow with a combination of stuffing and pipe cleaners. I used felt to make teeth all around the opening of the hoodie and some white jersey for the teeth. This picture is after I spent an hour observing karate and sewing up the breastplate (the ridges are pipe cleaners sewn into the fabric) to the delight of the homeschooled kid next to me. I gave The Goose the iPad and chatted with this 12 yo for the full 45 minutes while sewing. I'd be a homeschooler if I wasn't so lazy.
Finished product: fangs attached. I'm really happy I took the extra step of tie dying the fabric.
We lucked out that a passel of Evan's co-workers had decided to be the Teenaged Mutant Ninja Turtles at an early Halloween party. One of them very kindly donated his shell to the cause and Evan covered it with about a million coats of spray paint to take it from colorful cartoon character to Kaiju Monster.
Oscar just needed a scar drawn on his brow.
Oscar, my erstwhile reluctant reader, has breezed through the first four books of Harry Potter. I'm forcing him to take a break. We're starting on the Percy Jackson books this week.
Halloween Parade!
Bret Harte School has their parade in the courtyard of the school on Halloween morning. All the kids drag out their chairs and make an oval. Each classroom parades around the inside of the oval. Parents come, in costume, take pictures, and it's a fantastic community event.
I got there 2/3 of the way through this year due to preschool dropoff. I was there just in time to see Oscar parade with his class.
He's first in line after his sub teacher (his actual teacher doesn't want to have anything to do with Halloween -- which is totally fine -- she took off the days around Halloween) in the red robe.
I finally found Arlo's class -- it was difficult since his beloved teacher was under inches of green makeup, complete with fake nose and chin.
This is two of Arlo's classmates. The one shading her eyes is Arlo's "girlfriend."
Gamera was pretty pleased with himself.
Arlo's friend was the Doctor. And that means we have chosen friends well.
Another kid had a full-on showgirl costume. What the heck?!?
On the way out. I noticed that the school board had been changed to congradulate the school on their raised API score.
Seriously. can you image a school in SOM putting test scores on the board outside? and awarding medals and trophies to students that achieved high scores and improved their scores from last year?
Brave new world, I tell you.
After school. our first trick or treat victim was Janice, of Mike and Janice.
Gamera was happy to attack their home.
Periwinkle just wanted the sweets.
I was happy that I had Janice to take a picture of me and my minions. I was Medusa.
This is The Goose attempting to emulate the pose on the DVD cover.
Her costume was a little easier. Two velveteen leaves, with pipe cleaners sewn in to give it some shape, tucked around her little belly. Storebought white tutu and wings. Leggings dyed in the same batch as the velveteen. Hair teased up into the same topknot and sprayed with completely ineffectual white hair dye.
Medusa and Willard. Yes, we repurposed the l'il Willard costume into a big Willard costume. We are keeping a big box full of rats in storage now to bring out every couple years.
400+ pieces of candy. We only had about 200 kids, about half of last year.
The Goose lasted about an hour, Arlo 30 minutes after that, and Oscar B for another 30 minutes. When they gave up on trick or treating, they sat on the front porch with me and handed out candy. \\
Sorting is the best part.
Next year, I am going to insist that Oscar B picks a more esoteric costume that I can make for him. Three years straight in storebought costumes is like child abandonment for me. (Don't get huffy, buyer of storebought costumes: this is the only craftiness I do with and for my kids. Taking the easy way out (for me) two years in a row makes me cringe.)
Thursday and Friday were fine. Everybody was cranky from the late night and candy. Oscar spiked a fever and stayed home on Friday. Lots of reading and cuddling.
Saturday, we found this glorious creature on our back screen door. He/She was about three inches long and wanted to have nothing to do with us.
He/she scurried off. Evan brought Lucy to dance class and brought Oscar along to play baseball with him. Arlo and I peered at the mantis for a bit and decided to pull out and watch The Deadly Mantis.
More tormented election blatherings tomorrow.
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