Halloween 2013

The boys bought light sabers at Disney World over the summer.  I had an old Yoda costume that Jack wore back when he was Bo's age.

Jack was a cute Yoda, no?

Bo is a similarly cute Yoda.   And for all of you that have said you think Jack and Bo look alike, you are obviously right!!  And I'm not exaggerating when I say Jack's head is gigantic.  Look how Jack's filling out that Yoda hat compared to Bo.  Ha!     

Anyway, the Star Wars costume plan sounded great when I concocted it back in August.

And then I did nothing.  And kept doing nothing.  

At the beginning of the month I thought, "hey Jen you better get cracking on these costumes".  And at that point, I did a little research.  I "ASSUMED" that I would find a regular sewing pattern and just sew it all up.  I mean seriously, how popular is Star Wars?  There should have been oodles of costume patterns and tutorials out there.

HA!

There was NOT!  

There were NONE!  

Oh my word, what in the WORLD was I going to do?  I eventually found some sort of wizard costume pattern for Justice's Jedi top, but I had to modify it, AND shrink it because it was an adult size costume and he is nowhere close to adult size.  

Jack?  Ugh.  Thank the heavens above for my friend Annie and the Jedi costume she had.  It was exactly the right size for Jack and I was able to use it as a reference for his costume when I drew his pattern.  

Oh my goodness, yes.  I had to draw the pattern from scratch.  

And just so you know how technical I am (ha, not), I'm going to let you peek inside my brain for a few minutes.

OK, so I'm scratching my head over the Jedi robe.  I hate to sew in sleeves.  So I'm trying to find a way around that... So I get out a piece of paper and start fooling around with it, and eventually something comes to me.  I draw what I perceive as a Jedi robe shape onto the paper.  But first, I make sure the fold is at the top of the robe.  To simulate the fold of the fabric.   I cut a neck hole in it, and then just slice all the way up the front to represent the opening of the robe.

BAM!  I open it up and it magically did exactly what I'd hoped it would do.  

So then I just adapted the mini pattern into a life sized one based on Jack's height.  I added a hood doing the same method.  Paper first, fooled around with it until it was right, then cut it out on the fabric. I only had to sew the outside seams together, add the hood and hem the front opening, hem and sleeves.  The best part was that I didn't have to set-in sleeves separately.  Yay for that.

People always say to me:

"I don't know how you do it!!"

Well, me EITHER!  HA!!!  And when I say that, you can now know with absolute certainty that I mean it.  I have no idea how I do it, and you've now seen the proof!  My projects are a crap shoot from beginning to end.

Remember the CD I used that was too big for the bib neck?  It was perfect for the robe.  I'm so technical, right?  Ha!  

It ended up to be perfect.  He really liked it, I imagine this will get worn often.

Then I set out to draw the pattern for Jack's tunic top.  

I took the tunic top that my friend let me borrow, and roughed it out on scratch paper.  Then, armed with a ruler and a colored pencil, I drew each piece onto large sheets of paper.

You can see where I've drawn several lines.  That line represents a shoulder seam that I just COULD NOT get right.  Eventually I did, but it took forever.  

It was a complicated top with five pattern pieces.  It had a base shirt with set-in sleeves (and we've already established that I hate set-in sleeves), an attached vest, and also an attached double-shouldered sash.  It took six hours to draw the pattern and make the top, mostly because I had to rip the sleeves out twice.  Because sleeves are tragic.  It was worth it though, because it looked great.  The only modification I had to do while sewing was to add a bias-tape keyhole neckline and tie to the back of the shirt because the neckline was too small for Jack to get his gigantic head through. 

See that?  Yeah, that's not supposed to happen.  That's what happens when you are tired, have a crying baby in the other room, and are trying to hurry through a project.  

The pants were super easy.  I used a pattern that I had drawn a few years ago for pajama pants.  Worked like a champ, and I had the pants done in a few hours for both pair.  

Justice's top was harder than I anticipated.  That was the only thing I had a legitimate pattern for, and although I had to shrink it all to his size, I figured it wouldn't be too hard.  

However, the directions for his top SUCKED.  Pattern directions sometimes do suck, but normally I will eventually figure it out.  NOT THIS TIME!  I absolutely NEVER figured out how to attach the band to the front of the tunic.  I got it on there eventually, but not like the pattern said.  I was so deep into figuring out the directions, finally I just had to detach myself from them and look at it as logically as I could and sewed it on.  Whatever, the end result was still the same.  And I still intend to contact Simplicity about their stupid directions.  I have a decent amount of sewing experience, it absolutely should NOT have been that difficult.

Anyhow, I also had to modify the sleeves and the belt but once I got that stupid band around the top it was fine.

Did I mention I had a helper?  

I was happy with the way everything turned out.  I have learned a huge lesson though about waiting until the last minute.  I do work well and best under pressure, but that was too much pressure.  Going into Halloween with only 72 hours, no patterns, no clue and a baby was too much this year.  Of course I got it done, I wouldn't ever let the kids down, but it was not easy.

But they are super cute.  

The costumes aren't bad, either. :)

 My favorite picture doesn't show a lot of costume detail, but my babies faces are pretty cute.

 We piled into the car and went to Trunk or Treat at the church.  The weather was PERFECT.  70 degrees outside and just perfect.  The kids had a great time going from trunk to trunk collecting candy.  Jack spent most of his time chasing after his little love, Jessie. 

The Coach decided to grace us with his presence at Trunk or Treat, and even decorated the back of the car!  What?  I know, right?

And he won third place for his efforts!  Ha!

OK, so here he is with his prize.  A dish of candy.  And he was really working my nerves about this picture I was trying to take with him and his prize.

Intentionally TRYING not to smile.

Then the biggest fake smile he could muster up.  Ugh.  Drives me crazy.  He was in rare form tonight!

Halloween day itself was a stormy and nasty mess.  It rained all morning with gale force winds.  Jack didn't care a bit about the threat of bad weather, he simply exclaimed that he hoped he wouldn't get struck by lightning while he was trick or treating.

I was worried.  We typically have trick-or-treaters by the hundreds in our neighborhood.  And I had already purchased enough candy for that many trick or treaters.  I was worried they wouldn't come, and I would have all this candy left over.  I was also sad that the boys wouldn't get to go and get any candy of their own.  So what do I do? 

I make up a big giant lie.  A lie about the Halloween Candy Ghost.  Yes, yes.  If inclement weather hampers trick or treating plans then you simply must sleep in your costume and leave your candy bucket out and the Halloween Candy Ghost will come and fill up your bucket.  "Oooohhhhh" they said.... Jack said "YAY"!  

I told Justice later at night:

Me:  "Thanks for going along with the whole dumb candy ghost bit."

Justice, crestfallen and shocked:  "What?  You made it up?  MOM, I believed you!!"

Ahhhhh, Justice.  So smart and yet so gullible.    THEN, he says:

"Next thing you know you're gonna tell me Santa is a big fat lie, too!"

Oh Justice.

Anyhow, the weather calmed down enough to take the boys out.  I took them out, and The Coach handed out candy.

  The Coach is awful at giving out candy.  

You know the big ladies with the tiny babies?  The ones that come around with a toothless baby and a bucket to get "the baby" some candy?

Not at the Mack house.

Meet Joe, the Candy Nazi.  Classy as always, handing out candy in his slippers.

Joe, in the best ghetto he knows how:  

"Your baby ain't even got any teeth, you ain't gettin no candy from me.  Go on."

And oh wow, how about the teenagers?  He gives the older kids candy IF they have on a costume, and ONLY after giving them hell first.  

"How old are you?  You got a beard!  You don't need to be out here trick or treating!"  

And the little kids that don't have on a costume?  He always gives them candy, but not without giving their Mom a ration of hell first.

"You know you coulda put something on this child before you left the house!"  "Lazy people around here" he then says under his breath.  I try and tell him they probably can't afford it but he says you can make plenty of free costumes at home and that's no excuse.

It's horrible.  I remember one year he refused to give a teenage boy any candy because he didn't have a costume on.  About an hour later the kid was back, with his Mom's dress and lipstick on!  It was CLASSIC!  Joe was tickled to death and gave the kid a whole slew of candy.

He had a new one tonight.  He yelled at every single kid that stepped foot on our grass.  Every one of them.  And we did indeed have hundreds of trick or treaters.

"GET OFF THE GRASS!!!  THAT'S WHAT THE SIDEWALK IS FOR!!"

If I'm giving out the candy, I give it out to everybody.  To Mom's of toothless babies, to bearded teens, and to the lazy Mom's kids without a costume.  Cause I don't care.  Just take the candy and go, Happy Halloween.

The kids had a great time, as usual.  Jack got really tired though almost halfway through and we had to bring him home early.  As a matter of fact, Jack busted INTO someone's house as they opened the door and very politely told them he would rather have a glass of water than a piece of candy.

Oh Jack-Jack.

And OH WOW.  Really?  Nice photo bomb.  Sigh.

Happy Halloween!