costumes from mom

This year I made Eloise's costume for Halloween again.  She is dressing up as Laura Ingalls and has been planning it for months.  Every year as Halloween rolls around, I feel like I am paying a little tribute to my own mom.

Every single year my mom created our costumes for us.  We would come up with the ideas together and she would sew different components or the whole damn thing.   She would paint or tape or pin or stretch or manipulate any variety of materials to get just the right look.  She also must have run about 50 errands to find that extra little touch that our costume needed.  My mom is extremely creative and talented.  She is a terrific sewer also.  There were times I remember going to bed (at whatever time The Carol Burnett Show was over) with nothing to wear and waking up the next morning with a complete outfit and accessories newly sewn and hanging from my bedroom door--all sewn in a few hours time.

 Looking back on it now, I realize how special it made me feel to have a homemade costume.   Also, I remember what I was for Halloween just about every year of my childhood:  angel, clown, ladybug, bumblebee, Rubik's cube, valley girl, bag of jelly beans, Dorothy.  I know they may not have been the most unique and most creative costumes of all time but to me they were brilliant and they were just one more reason I was in awe of my mother.  I mean, there were four of us!

As I do the costumes for the girls each year now, I know that the joy of putting them together is not just for the costume wearer.  I know why my mom did it.  It is so much fun.  Whoever thought I would be so in love with 5 trips to Michael's to find the perfect flowers for Mary Poppins' hat?  Why didn't I expect the thrill of piecing together a pirate vest and cutting a little skull and crossbones out of felt?  Who could have anticipated the excessive giggling brought on every time I thought of one of my black DKNY knee-highs stuffed with batting for a tail on the black kitty costume?    When I see the excitement on Eloise's face and I see how much fun she has dressing up in the costumes I made, and I see just how darn appreciative she is, I take a moment and thank my mom.
I get it now.

maggie simpson,  2006

black kitty, 2007

friendly pirate,  2008

mary poppins and bert,  2009

laura ingalls, 2010 

(still working on this one...)

lazy

We've been a little lazy around here lately.  Summer is winding down but the temperature and humidity are still soaring.  All of our summer trips and big events are over and we are just going to stay put for awhile.  Since I am not really good at staying put, I've been looking for simple, fast, easy, and fun projects to do during nap time.  Something other than sitting on the couch and watching whatever has been tivo'd from Bravo.

I came across this sewing tutorial that seemed to fit the bill.  It was called "Lazy Days Skirt".  How perfect can you get?  It is a PDF provided by Liesl of Oliver+S.  They have darling and amazing patterns which are super easy to read and follow.  Most patterns from the big companies (McCalls, Vogue, etc.) can be very confusing and somehow seem like they were translated from another language not quite correctly.  Oliver +S makes patterns for children (please make them for adults!) and they run about $15.00.  This one is absolutely free, easy, and great for lazy days.  It is simple and not fussy at all.

I loved that there was no pattern, just instructions to read.  I made my skirt even lazier by using bias tape to finish the hem instead of the grosgrain ribbon she suggests.  We had a scrap of fabric that Eloise loves.  We got it here.  It has fairies, butterflies, stars, castles, AND it is pink and purple.  Basically, it was made for my daughter.  Finished this in one sitting and plan to do some more for school days.  Give it a try!


http://www.oliverands.com/downloads/Oliver+SLazyDaysSkirt.pdf

scrap fabric turned into a garment!

sometimes I wish she felt just a little 

more lazy

*

buttons

A couple weeks ago I was driving with Eloise and I commented on what a beautiful day it was.  I told her it reminded me of the kind of weather we had on our wedding day.  She asked if that was the day when I 'spilled the buttons'.  I could not figure out what she was talking about and then I realized Mike must have had told her the 'button story'.  Thinking back on it, I think it was kind of, sort of, maybe the exact moment that I fell in love with Mike.

When we were first dating Mike was living in Chicago and I was still in Toledo.  I had been to visit him a couple of times and now it was time for him to visit me in Toledo.  Things were getting serious.

In my rush to get things ready and my apartment all cleaned up, I had thrown a ton of stuff into this huge walk- in coat closet in the living room. In addition to coats, it was also part craft closet, part kitchen storage, part Target overstock warehouse, so there were clothes, shoes, bags, coats, skillets, crafts, fabric, all kinds of stuff in there.  Also, I had recently spilled a jar of about 32,000 buttons, all shapes and sizes, and they were now covering the whole floor of the closet.  I just closed the door and hoped that no one would see that a tornado had gone off inside.  In our relationship we were still at that early stage when you care about what the other person thinks of you and you want to make a good impression.  Ahhh, love.

At some point after Mike's arrival we decided to go out to dinner.  I needed to get my coat.  Damn it! Not wanting to ruin the illusion of my perfection, I told Mike to please not look into the closet and I just had to grab something real quick.  It went a little something like this:

Me:  Don't look.
Him:  Okay.
Me:  Look away.
Him: I will.
Me:  Did you see?
Him: No.
Me:  Did you?
Him: No.
Me:  Do you swear?
Him: Yes, I swear!
Me:  Okay.  Good.

Him:  Liz?
Me:  Yeah?
Him:  Do you have any buttons?

Ten years later, I now have my buttons organized into color coded compartments
and sorted by size and material.  But, if you were worried that marriage has changed me and I have lost my true self, just take a look at my closets sometime.  On second thought, please don't.

 Happy Anniversary, honey.