Ah yes. Darn, missed that one.
That is my favorite silly joke of all time !
I spent a couple of hours last night making a pair of bat ears out of a Cheerios box, some stiff plastic from a Crystal Light container, and the fabric of a dollar store umbrella. If I’d had some craft foam, I probably could have whipped some up in ten minutes, but noooooooo…that would involve going to the store.
Making kids’ costumes can take a ridiculous amount of effort at times, but it is sort of fun, especially when you see them wearing it.
My God - this is TOTALLY off topic but I have exactly the same sewing machine table thing that you do. It got bought for me when I was married by my father, I think, and my ex wife refused to take it so I have it now.
I always buy too much candy because I’m still traumatized by the first Halloween in my own home.
Right after getting married we bought a house in a rather isolated little neighborhood way out in the county. There were about 50 houses there, many occupied by retired couples, so on our first Halloween we bought what we thought was plenty of candy. We were young and excited about handing it out for the first time.
Well, none of the neighbors thought to warn us that on Halloween night, people who lived even further out in the county would bring their kids to our neighborhood to trick-or-treat. Truckloads of them; I stopped counting after the first hundred children. We quickly ran out of candy and had to turn off the lights and watch forlornly as our house was bypassed.
So now I buy too much, and towards the end of the night I’m giving out big handfuls to the stragglers to get rid of it.
Couple of years ago, went to a Halloween costume party at a local watering establishment.
GF (now wife) dressed as Cihuacoatl (Aztec snake goddess, several alternate spellings) complete with 5 feet of python around her neck. The snake was quite calm and drooped its head down between her breasts. It was hardly noticable as anything except part of the costume. Wandering drunks would stick their noses as close as they dared to properly assay her endowment. While staring, they would eventually notice the flicker of a forked tongue. If they got too close, the snake would produce a rather startling Hiiissssss and open its mouth defensively. Commonest reaction was a loud scream. (Luckily snakes don’t hear sounds.) Frequently the scream was accompanied by falling over backwards. Needless to say, she didn’t have any problems with unwanted drunken advances that night.
My costume was the grim reaper- standard black cape and hood, skeletal paint on face. But also a live turkey vulture on my left hand, and a full 7 foot long scythe in my right. Door boss looked at the bird and the scythe, and declared that I couldn’t “take both inside”. Why? No clue. Maybe because I didn’t have a free hand for drinking? Didn’t really object to my carrying a knife with a 2+ foot blade, just couldn’t have both the scythe and the bird. Oh well.
So I checked my scythe and proceeded to the bar. (Yes, of course GF and I split up, so we could watch people’s reactions.) I perched Ralf (the vulture’s name) on the edge of the bar and ordered each of us a scotch. Drunks would stagger up, sit next to Ralf, and then turn toward him and – well, the expressions were precious.
Even better-- when vultures get cold they “exhibit their reptilian ancestry” – they extend their wings and bask in the sun. Ralf decided that the bright strobe over the bar was the sun and he’d periodically prepare to warm up. Let me just say that a pure black bird with a naked red face and a 7 foot wingspan can make himself quite comfortable at even the most crowded bar.
Later the manager brought me my scythe. Actually, he went around yelling that the owner of “this damn big knife had better come get it”. Eventually I heard him and Ralf and I retrieved it. (Maybe he was afraid that the door keeper would use it on somebody? Don’t know. Passes all understanding.) So Ralf and I, with scythe, went back to the exceedingly crowded bar. We were instantly accommodated. People bought us drinks. People even offered to pay us to “take care of” certain little inter-personal problems they had.
Made it all quite a party. Maybe we’ll reprise it again some year-- at a different bar.
Got a pic already from the hostess of the Halloween party I went to this past Friday. I decided to can the Marie Antoinette costume in favor of the Generic Roman Broad costume. It was raining like hell and muddy and gross that night and the Roman costume was easier to wash. The cat is named Damocles. He was really nice.
Here’s the pic:
I went to breakfast with Mr. K this past weekend and they had a life-sized ghoul dude dressed as a creepy butler. I swear he was givin’ me the stink eye. I’m still a little unnerved over it. If I was a kid, keeee-rist…I’d be having nightmares.
Other than that, I’m just looking forward to what I anticipate as the ultimate Halloween spectator sport: That Celebration that Occurs in Las Vegas.
I’ll let you know how it turns out.
Damn it, I have a costume emergency. I was going to go as one of those Guinness “Brilliant!” guys, and bought a labcoat, a brown vest thing, and a bowtie. The labcoat arrived, but the vest and bowtie have not, and will not by tomorrow before I have to go to work. I’m upset, cause I actually went out of my way to not trim the mustache portion of my beard so I could have a real handlebar mustache. Well, I have to nix that idea, and have decided to go as Dr.Cox from Scrubs.
What I need, though, is a template for the nametag. I have almost no Photoshop skills, so while I could make something, it would basically be a picture of me, the name D.Cox, and a red bar across the top (because if you’ve seen the show, you know the doctor’s have red bars on the top of their nametags.) I looked around online for a template, but I couldn’t find one.
Has anyone heard of “Booing”? It’s a neo-neighborhood-ritual kinda thing.
When I was out taking my photos, a bunch of houses had signs in the window that read “We Got Booed!” Apparently, neighbors leave gift bags/baskets on people’s doorstep anonymously. In turn, the “Boo-ee”(?) makes up a package and put it on an un-signed neighbor’s porch.
I think I’d put up a sign the first day and save myself a lot of effort.
I just put on my costume for the first time. I find that it reflecs my inner self to an uncomfortable degree - uncomfortable, because I’m going as a forest-dwelling madwoman.
Even stranger was the reaction of my rat Dexter. There are normal rats - I have 19 of those - and then there’s Dexter, who I swear is a wererat. His previous owner gave him to me precisely because he’s so odd that she felt I “needed” him. How strange is the wee beastie? Let’s put it this way: if he speaks in human tongue tomorrow, I won’t be surprised in the least.
I expected my rather shocking appearance - there’s not much of me visible - and the unusual scents would spook the rodents. Not Dexter. He took one look at me and couldn’t run fast enough to leap on my shoulder. He’s currently bruxing like a chainsaw and couldn’t appear happier. I am now terribly tempted to visit the local petstore in costume with him before the little snots arrive to ruin my fun.
As for the yard, I knew I had gone overboard with props, but until I dragged everything out of storage I hadn’t realized how overboard. The mannequins are standing like a silent army in my living room, waiting their opportunity to invade the lawn. And still, it appears my neighbor will beat me in our friendly annual rivalry. He’s parked his car on the lawn amongst the tombstones, and I can’t wait to see what he’s going to do with it.
I went as Tom Jones for Halloween. Booya.
What’s really sad is that the costume I did have picked out ended up not fitting, so I just had to pull all that out of my closet. Woohoo.
I wound up recycling last year’s costume on Saturday (one of the benefits of moving to a different city!): Medusa. My plans for tomorrow night consist of getting together with a friend to watch Rocky Horror Picture Show and Ed Wood on DVD, and making sure I’ve got at least some candy on hand on the off chance I get trick-or-treaters in my apartment building.
Like two years ago my friend Dave used a homemade shirt making program to make up his pwn Guinness t-shirt. As I was looking at it something seemed a little odd. It had a picture of those two guys, and under them was the word “Brillant!”
I’m recycling last year’s costume as well. My new workplace gets into Halloween with a contest and such. Since only one of my coworkers has seen me in it, I’m doing “scuba diver” again. Kayak (sleevless) wetsuit, turtleneck, watersox. But the best part is my homemade airtank - a sonotube (cardboard tube used to pour footings) plus a large Christmas tree ornament and some plumbing.
Brian
Ugh, yes, someone in our neighborhood came up with this bright idea a couple of years ago. Worse yet, we dutifully put up our sign and someone still did it to us again!
I hate it when people come up with new traditions that add to the expense and obligations of the holidays.
They’re letting us dress up today at work for Halloween. Not feeling terribly adventerous, I just wore my nice suit, and put in some vampire teeth. Two co-workers, seeing me from far away, thought I was a televangelist. When they saw me up close with the teeth, they still thought I was a televangelist.
I’m going with it.
So I was up until about 2 this morning and got a few hours sleep and up again at 6:30 to finish costume making. WHY do I do this to myself every time? I still have to finish before 3:00:
Glinda’s crown - the main bit is made, just have to find the hot glue gun and the silver Mardi Gras beads hidden somewhere in the toddler’s room so I can glue them to the edge, and glue on the silver star I made this morning to the middle bottom. It’s a pretty awesome crown, I do have to say. I made a backing out of thick paper, with a layer of thick interfacing and topped with sparkly fabric.
The zipper in Glinda’s dress. Ugh. I hate zippers. I’ve been sewing for 20 years, and I think I’ve put in about four zippers in that time. I usually find a way to put in eyelets and cording instead, but it just wouldn’t work with this design.
Ichigo’s (?) kimono and dickey - the pieces are all cut out, just gotta sew and iron and sew and iron. Hell if I’m slip stitching the entire front edge from hem around the neck and down back to the other hem, though. Overstitching will have to suffice.
I might have to make a quick throw together Tin Man costume out of thick craft paper, aluminum foil and duct tape over a grey sweatshirt, but since my husband was puking his guts out yesterday, I’m not sure he’s in the best shape to go supervise trick-or-treating. I might get out of that one.
Oh, AND I have to make two dishes to bring to the post-trick-or-treating potluck, since some hippie freaks decided that pizza wasn’t a healthy enough dinner to acompany the three tons of candy our kids will be scarfing tonight. So let’s hear it for slow-cooker lentil curry and butternut squash apple soup! Neither of which I’ve made before, but they can’t be too hard, right? 
All that to do, and of course I’m checking the Dope. :smack:
Selkie, sounds like you and Dexter would be perfect companions! Ralf would love to have someone to talk to. Does Dexter like scotch?
I don’t know where your ‘dark cloud’ is – ours is approaching right now from the southeast. This Halloween will be a rain-out. Perhaps next time.
Sadly, we don’t decorate the lawn since we moved here. The nearest neighbor is half a mile away on the paved road. And there’s 1,400 feet of gravel driveway between the pavement and the house. Sigh! Nobody trick or treats us any more.
They did this at my workplace last year - a mug of candy appeared on my desk with instructions to “pass on the fun”.
Although the sales and accounting departments are aggressively celebrating today, I work in engineering and we’re not usually a festive bunch. But one of our guys is dressed up as Dwight Schrute, and he looks great.
Screw it. I’m dressed as Number Two.