Halloweanie
Today was a pleasingly productive Saturday. I managed to clean the apartment, do laundry, get groceries and make some serious headway on the whole costume situation.
Really, the costume situation pertains only to my four year old. He didn’t even get to go trick-or-treating when he was 1.5, so I figure that my one year old’s costume can be pretty minimal. And indeed, I spent $13 on a hooded sweatshirt made of fake fur and colored to look like a dog and figure that with the addition of black sweats, I’ve done my job. He will be entirely oblivious to his costume anyway, so he needs a costume to which he can be entirely oblivious (yet still warm).
My four year old, however, requires a bit more effort. You may recall last year’s Thomas costume and I was fully expecting to tackle a similar undertaking this year.
When I first started asking him what he wanted to be (I figured there’d be much asking and many changes until something just seemed right), he told me he wanted to be a moon. A moon, huh? I thought to myself while mentally scratching my head. I wasn’t quite sure how I’d do it, but I was up to the challenge.
However, after only a few repeats of wanting to be a moon, he started talking trains again, which is what I was really expecting. After a wide range of trains were discussed over many asking occasions, he finally settled on Percy, a small green train, and I started looking at images of Percy to see how I might proceed with my masterpiece.
But then, after a while of contenting himself with Percy, he decided he wanted to be a ghost. I checked with him several times to make sure he was certain about changing his mind and he confirmed that he was, so I started thinking ghost. I myself was a ghost for Halloween one year and I recall that my parents’ greatest struggle had been how to get the white sheet to stay on my head and the eye holes to stay at my eyes. Finally, they settled on the questionable solution of tying a “noose” around my neck, which was presumably meant to imply how I had become a ghost in the first place. I wound up looking more like the “ghosts” we made in kindergarten by placing a tissue over a sucker and tying some yarn around the stick to keep it on.
I figured I could do a hell of a lot better for my son. First of all, I didn’t want one uniform sheet. I envisioned several varying layers of sheets, all cut jaggedy at different places, maybe even some in pale grey to give depth and clarity to the layers. Further, I would sew all these layers to a white hooded sweatshirt, which would solve the problem of the eye holes staying in place, and would allow him to use his arms without throwing the costume off…plus, no noose required.
However, before I could implement my genius vision, my four year old changed his mind again, this time for the last time he assured me. What is my newest and final challenge, you ask? A black cat.
I feel simultaneously cheated and relieved. Black sweats with a tail sewn on back, a black hooded sweatshirt with ears sewn on, black eyeliner to create nose and whiskers. I tried to suggest he at least be a black and white cat so that I could sew a white fake fur belly to his shirt front and get him white mittens, but no, he wants black. I had girded my loins for a far greater challenge, and thus far the biggest challenge has been finding black sweats (we had to go to two whole stores). But really it’s okay. While I would have gone to great lengths to create something very cool for my son, I’m also pretty content taking the lazy route, especially if he’s just as happy.
October 21st, 2007 at 5:20 pm
The noose kills me! My bro was a ghost for halloween one year. My parents cut a hole in a big sheet and sort of purse-stringed it around his neck, then painted his face white.
The black cat is great. Just don’t be surprised if he changes his mind again…