Tuesday, November 5, 2013

Halloween 2013

Happy very belated Halloween!

I was oblivious to how much I enjoy dressing up before this Halloween - dressing up was just always something you did, kind of like a non-optional social convention. However, when I look back at how we kind of really enjoy dressing up for Halloween, and make excuses to dress up for birthday parties, and how I'm willing to put in a good amount of effort for our family's costumes, it struck me that I really do enjoy dressing up.

And also that I'm a geek.

That's right - I let my geek-flag fly this year! I've always wanted to dress up my boys as ewoks (come on, who hasn't??), and I saw it as a great opportunity to dress up a Princess Leia! But not the cinnamon buns outfit. Or the slinky bikini, either. Nope, I had to dress like Leia on the forest moon Endor. Which basically left me with two outfit options: brown dress, or camo poncho. After a trip to Value Village, I decided the poncho would be my best bet. Not from the presence of any ponchos on their racks, mind you. No, I found a scrap sheet of white fleece and decided to make a poncho from that. So, I cut a hole for the head, trimmed some excess fabric off an end and reattached it from a collar on the poncho. But Leia's poncho isn't white - it's camo. What to do, what to do? Well, having never dyed anything before in my life I decided to start easy by dying with tea! I did a base color of a camel-brown from orange pekoe tea bags. The fleece took it very well actually, and while tea dying can result in an uneven color with a marble effect, that works perfectly for camo! I washed and dried the fabric to let the color set and then got some acrylic paints to sponge on the contrasting camo colors. $2 for the fleece, $1/acrylic color, and I've got one Rebel leader poncho! A few braids, a belt, some light pants and a blaster, and I was set to be Leia!
My biggest boy found an Optimus Prime costume at a garage sale this summer, and he's been waiting ever since for Halloween, so he was all set, and for the other two, my little ewoks, I made ewok hoods! Well, first I crocheted a cowl hood with bear ears attached, then I sewed a felt hood on top! The bigger ewok got the spear :) Oh, and my husband went as James Hetfield from the 80s.... Yah.


Happy belated Halloween!

Mrs. VanderLeek ;)

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