Rainbow Fish Penelope

Eeeek!! I am beyond thrilled with how little Penelope's costume turned out. We weren't sure what to dress her up as but I had some leftover fabric from C's costume, and I really wanted to have the girls "match" somehow. One day we were reading my favorite childhood book, and suddenly I knew EXACTLY what P should be. It was too perfect!

I will go into some details, but first...

A Fisherman's Tale:
(I am literally making this up as I write it, so it's not perfect poetry!)

There once was a fisherman who lived by the sea.
He was a happy lad, but also lonely.
Until one fine day when he cast his line out,
and out came a fish!! Salmon, or trout?

She was neither of those- but a special little fishy.
One who was sparkling, sweet, and squishy!
Her scales boasted purples, blues, and pink-
And in her tiny mouth, a drooly BINK BINK (that is what I sometimes call her binky..ha)

She was better than anything the fisher could wish-
because at his feet, sat the Rainbow Fish!

She glanced back at the ocean for just a pause,
and longed for what could be- not what was.

Because she knew that the fisherman up above,
had something much better to offer- LOVE!

Now best friends with a marvelous tale,
she baby-fish babbled, "Want one of my scales?"

 haha! I coudn't resist. They are just so cute together.
a few details about her costume: the scales are felt, and because I got lazy at this point in costume-making, I simply hot glued them onto the onesie (with cardboard in between the fabric layers). I sewed the scales to the back loosely by hand, and then the dorsal fin. The tail is scales glues onto more felt :) And those fish eyes! That is a styrofoam ball cut in half with black felt circles as eyeballs. Pretty easy!

I had to get some shots of the girls together. Ocean buddies!

Happy {early} Halloween!

Mermaid Charlotte

Over the summer, Charlotte fell in love with all things mermaid. So I knew that making her a mermaid costume for Halloween would just tickle her pink!

She kept telling me "No, I want to be Ariel." I love Ariel, too, but I snagged some sparkly sequin and fish scale fabric from Joanns over the summer and I wanted to use it! She remained unconvinced...UNTIL she put it on. She couldn't stop smiling, giggling, and twirling her hair :)

This costume was somewhat tricky. I had no idea how I would do the tail...so I just started cutting, stuffing, and sewing and this is what I came up with. It's basically an elastic-waist skirt that is shorter in the back (I wanted to be sure she could walk!). The tail hangs down in the front, and underneath she has fish scale pants. Her top was less complicated, I just sewed the sequin fabric to one of her tank tops, and then some fabric flower trim at the neckline. Her floral crown truly took about 3 minutes- it was so easy! Just measured her head with some thick floral wire, then wrapped the flowers and hot glued them in place. I really love blues, purples, and pinks together.

Anyways, back to my cute mermaid!
Here she is sitting alongside "the ocean", dreaming of what it must be like to have feet ;) (Ignore the very obvious feet sticking out from her tail, HAHA...)

Every proper mermaid brushes her hair with a dinglehopper!

Grammaw gave her a shell necklace a little while ago, and we used it to make a sweet little shell bracelet! The perfect mermaid accessory :)

^^^ my favorite. ^^^

Here she is singing "Ahh-ahh-ahh..." hehe...

"Look, those birds in the water!" I know what you're thinking...there are no swans in the ocean. This may be true, but I didn't tell her that ;)

 Can you tell just a little bit that she loves her costume? haha. Love my sweet fishy-tailed girl. 

Diamond Steve Talmage

It's that time of year again!!! Our costume post is always my favorite. Jonathan and I aren't big on dressing up (okay, I admit I like to dress up Jonathan occasionally) but we get SUPER excited dreaming up costumes for the kiddos. And no, we don't always make them ourselves. But when we do it is extra fun! This year we decided to make costumes and they turned out pretty great, if I do say so myself ;)

I'm breaking up all the costume pictures so that this post isn't forever long. First up is our little man! Talmage's Papa (my dad) got him the game of Minecraft last Christmas and since then he has become OBSESSED. Actually, our whole family is really into the Minecraft thing. What's not to love? It's basically a boy's virtual dreamworld where he can explore anywhere, build and create anything, and defend himself against the monsters! It is the perfect outlet for Talmage, and he just loves everything about it. So of course, he wanted to be only one thing for Halloween...Diamond Steve!

If you aren't familiar with Minecraft, Steve is the main character and diamond armor is the best kind of armor for its rare quantity and durability. We were too lazy to make the whole suit of diamond armor, so we opted for a diamond blue t-shirt and a diamond sword. The only part of this costume that we had to make was the bucket (dollar store bucket spray painted silver) and Steve head. We covered the head in clear packing tape in case it rains while he goes trick-or-treating. I mean, we do live in Oregon. The tape made it feel sturdier, too. His eyes peek out from a hole where Steve's nose is supposed to be. haha...if you look closely you can see him looking out!

Here he is doing the typical Steve thing- trekking through forest and gathering food, watching out for creepers and spiders lurking behind the trees, and chopping down trees!

He needed his handy torch to light the way, of course.

He forged apples, potatoes, wheat, and sticks!

 We pretended that the little red barn was his house made of bricks. haha!

What an adventure! Now he just needs to track down some candy for his bucket! ;)

He is even more adorable without the square head. ha ha!