Tuesday, October 31, 2006

the trouble with Lola

Last year, Lola decided to be a princess for Halloween (rejecting the painstakingly made Tinky Winky costume I had saved from when Iris was her age, a costume so good a little child followed Iris down the sidewalk and into her Kindermusik class, saying in awe, "Tinky Winky! Tinky Winky!"). I made her a fancy pink princess gown with medieval veiled hat.

This year, she said ahead of time that she would be a princess again. That was fine by me, as we had two suitable princess gowns, extremely elaborate gowns sewn by me (one so difficult to make that I now feel qualified to sew the girls' wedding dresses should they ever marry, assuming they'd allow their aged mother to be their couturier). I figured I didn't need to lift a finger. Iris's costume of choice was to be her cat, Frowstomatic the Immortal God, and later she decided to add a cape reading "Super Cat" and be Frowstomatic the Immortal God & Super Cat. She already owned a black cat cap, courtesy of our friend M's Bunnywarez, so instead of sewing her a catsuit, I lazily bought her a black turtleneck, black leggings, and a black marabou boa, which I shortened to tail length. (This was the first year I didn't sew her an elaborate costume, and I feel ashamed).

Then, after we had assembled Iris's costume, Lola changed her mind. She wanted to be Al, her semi-retarded scrawny orange tabby (poor Al's natural idiocy is demonstrated on a daily basis). I couldn't just put this costume together so lazily (have you ever seen an orange turtleneck, size four year-old?). She stuck to this Al idea quite firmly, although I tried to convince her to be a fish,as I fell in love with a fish pattern. I ended up buying a pattern, yards of orange fake fur, and so on. After I'd cut out the fake fur pattern pieces, Lola announced she'd changed her mind and she was going to be Sleeping Beauty. I said, "Hell, no! You are going to be Al! I can't use that fake fur for anything else now, and I am NOT going to make another costume!"

She went back to thinking it was a good idea to go trick-or-treating as her cat.

The orange fake fur was terrible to sew, a frustrating fabric, but I finished the costume in a timely manner, and the fit was great (I'd altered the pattern pieces to ensure a good fit). However, Lola was in tears last night. I probed as to the reason, and it turns out that she felt she couldn't be a cat for Halloween because she is a vegetarian. I suggested that she could be Fashion Kitty, the vegetarian cat with super powers and a flair for fashion and helping others. This soothed the sniffling child. (We love "Fashion Kitty" and are eagerly awaiting a sequel).

God, I am ready to resign my role as Halloween Costume Creator. Needless to say, with all the sturm und drang over Lola's costume, I had no time to make myself anything decent. I picked up a cute Venetian mask, and I'm going to wear a formal gown and my black Venetian mask and be myself, but at a masqued ball in Venice. (I did once go to Venice, but not to any masqued balls, alas, and I need to return. I love Venice, and also due to constantly climbing all those little bridges over the canals, I returned with thigh muscles of the gods, which sadly atrophied the next month when I was put on bedrest for premature labor).

4 comments:

2amsomewhere said...

The reference to princesses reminds me of my six year-old niece. She's inherited her father's penchant for scary movies and has resisted her mother's annual efforts to get her to dress up as a princess for Halloween.

One year, she went as the Incredible Hulk. This year, when her mom asked her whether she wanted to be a princess, my niece replied, "I want to be a werewolf... who eats princesses."

I guess it's hard to find a good, scary werewolf mask for a child.

Anonymous said...

thanks for the linky-dink!

have you considered submitting photos of your amazing costumes to the make magazine blog? I bet they'd love to see them.

I was lazy this year - at a party I was DJing on Saturday I dressed as a bellydancer and goth'd it up, and played desertronica music, then for Sunday's boat party I wore my tired old pink bunny costume - it's almost three years old and I have worn it a lot.

tonight, we're going to a play with the housemate and we're all dressing as goths. it's the laziest halloween (at least as far as costumes!) I can remember. then again, I've been known to go as a ghost, which is a great costume, because:

- no makeup

- easy to make (no sewing!)

- you can wear comfy shoes

- fun to act (say "wooooooo" and raise your arms)

- all the other ghosts are automatically your friends

just don't try to buy a white sheet from thrift stores or BB&B the week before halloween! sold out! and nothing is more dorky than a patterend ghost.

happy halloween! take photos!

Trouble said...

I'm a huge fan of the goodwill for halloween costumage. I've never sewn a costume for my kids, and I never will...because I am "Slacker Mommy!!!"

Fear me.

muahahahahhaah.

But I did use your medusa costume, and it rocked, hard.

the Drunken Housewife said...

Halloween is my big creative holiday. I'm lazy drunken slacker mom over 300 days of the year, but for Halloween, I get busy. I'm glad, though, that the Medusa torch I lay down has been picked up by Spill the Beans! You go, snake girl!