Stress and Success (part III) + Halloween

And in the last week, I've been a sewing maniac. I made three Halloween costumes, altered two other costumes, finished a skirt for my sewing class, started and made a lot of progress on a nice collared shirt for one of my customers.

The costumes I made were fantastic. Jennie Ray was Daphne for Halloween, and she and I made a perfect purple dress and ascot for it. Rebecca Flake was the Little Mermaid during the "Kiss the Girl" song in the movie, so she and I made a pretty blue corset and a light blue skirt and altered a white blouse to go under the corset. I also made a zombie cheerleader costume for Alyssa who is 11 years old. (She's a girl I recently began mentoring, which I'll write a whole blog about later.) Her outfit was black with glittery skulls and white accents, including a big letter A on the front of her top. I also made her a black and white striped turtleneck and leggings to go underneath. Lastly I made two bows with the left over black and white striped ribbon for her hair. Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of her in her costume, and I'm really bummed about that. :(

Jennie & Becca's costumes.

Then Bob and I had been debating all week about our costumes. Someone in one of my classes mentioned Barbie and Ken the other day, and I thought that would be hilarious. Bob and I just watched Toy Story 3 last weekend, so I wanted to dress up like the Barbie and Ken from that movie. We'd found some wigs earlier in the week at a Halloween store. Then on Friday, the day before our Halloween party, we went to the DI searching for anything really. We lucked out with Bob and found some awesome pleated shorts, a horrible blue-patterned shirt, a belt, and even some sweet loafers. I looked and looked, and finally found what I thought might just work. It was an ugly light bluish-teal leisure suit kind of thing. I tried it on and it was kinda big and fit me weirdly, but I could alter it just fine and make it work. I found a perfect pink belt to go with it too, and borrowed some pink leg warmers, hot pink heels, and a pink head band from Jennie Ray.  I altered everything that night, and when Bob put his costume on he really wasn't sure if he could go as Ken. I think he was just embarrassed to be wearing the light blue ascot that I made him.

So Saturday rolled around and we had breakfast Jennie and Rebecca's apartment. I gave Chelsie a hair cut. We all carved pumpkins. And then we got ready for the night. I have to say, Bob and I looked so good!

Bob carved the cat, I carved the face with the stem as a nose.

We made it to our Halloween party a few minutes late. When we showed up everyone was seated at tables and the people in charge were giving instructions for how the evening would go. Bob and I walked in a door towards the front of the room and just stood next to the wall, looking for a place to sit. Then I noticed everyone looking at us and giggling. At one point the people up in front had to stop talking because everyone was laughing about our costumes instead of listening to instructions. Then I noticed that Bob had walked in stiff-armed and legged, smiling and waving like a Ken doll. I honestly loved all the attention.

We got so many compliments on our outfits. Everyone loved them I think, and everyone knew exactly who we were supposed to be. That was my favorite part, aside from the fact that nobody recognized us at first. They knew who we were dressed up as, but all the hair in the wigs really threw everybody off. It was great!

Mr. & Mrs. Potato Head were even there!

Bob as Ken.

Me as Barbie.

We ended up winning the Best Overall Costume award, a $10 gift certificate to Spoon It Up. I love frozen yogurt, and I love winning contests. It was so worth all the makeup and fake eyelashes and alterations and headaches of the week. Halloween has been great this year.