Halloween Costumes

I pretty much always make my own Halloween costumes.   Here are some of the most recent. 

This is one of my best costumes.  It wasn't actually for Halloween though.  (It was for a Murder Mystery Party.)

Then there was last year.  I was a witch.  I'd say I've been a witch about 50% of Halloweens.  I like wearing all black without people thinking I'm all dark and goth.

I typically try to go un-sexy for Halloween.  Someone asked me if I was dressed as Sara Palin's pregnant teen in this picture below.  Um, no, I was dressed as a soccer player.

Ok, well this might have had something to do with it.  But still.

And you know I had to have dressed as a character from the Office at least one time; Pam and Michael (circa season 2).  I had white Keds and everything.

Anyways.  This year I decided to go as un-sexy as possible, again.  I purchased an XL orange T-shirt from Michaels and sewed on the Jack-O-Lantern Face.  (It was slightly more difficult than I thought it would be.)  That green thing on my head is supposed to be the top of the pumpkin.  I'm not a "French" pumpkin as my husband kept telling people.  And that pumpkin was my purse for the night.

My husband went as Harry Potter, the college years.  We assumed Harry had cooler glasses once he was in college and didn't wear his robes around all the time.  I drew that scar.

Did you dress up this year for Halloween?

PS-I was going to put up cute pictures of me as a kid in my Halloween costumes but I was too lazy to go get the pics.  My mom made me a wonderful Dorothy costume as well as a nice Minnie Mouse.

Oh Yeah, How To Actually Throw the Murder Mystery Party

So I showed you how to decorate and I showed you how to make a costume but I didn't actually show you how to throw the murder mystery party. My husband volunteered to be in charge since he had actually been to one of these before. We got our party from this website. But I think there are other ones like it out there.

How to Throw a Murder Mystery Party

1-MOST IMPORTANT STEP. WATCH THIS EPISODE OF SAVED BY THE BELL AND THIS EPISODE OF THE OFFICE. THEY ARE BOTH INVALUABLE.
2-Send out an Evite to approximately 10-20 people stating that there will be a murder mystery party and that you need to know if they can come before assigning roles. Give the date and time and link to a website about murder mysteries.
3-Quickly re-send the evite when you realized you listed the wrong date for the party.
4-Send the invitees updates three to four times a day with things that you forgot to put on the original evite and then demand that they RSVP by a certain date.
5-Be sure to mention that if they RSVP and then do not show, they will be dead to you.
6-Have your husband (who is in charge of the murder mystery party) assign roles. Try to determine which of your girl friends will be the least likely to get mad at you for assigning them a male part due to the fact that 10 girls want to participate and only 4 guys.
7-Husband or leader emails the info on roles to everyone so that they have about a week to work on costumes.
8-Husband does a bunch of secret stuff involving secret files, lots of printed paper, sticky notes, etc. He finds it hilarious when your friends refuse to tell you their characters b/c he told them not to tell anyone, specifically you.
9-Work on Costumes and Decor
10-Have everyone agree to bring food or booze.
11-Have the party. The leader will have everything in the packet necessary to throw the party. Essentially when the guests get there they will be given a packet telling them how to act. One person will have a packet that says that they get murdered. Then mingling and eating happens. THEN THERE IS A MURDER! Everyone gets a second packet telling them how to act. One person is given a packet that says they are the murderer. More mingling and evidence is presented and then everyone guesses who the murderer is and votes on best dressed and best acting. Murderer is revealed and taken away, preferably in cuffs. Prizes are given. And then everyone eats, drinks and smokes cigars. Cigars are optional.

According to our un-scientific word of mouth poll, everyone had a great time and we'll proably do this again. Should we go cruise, western, pirate or Vegas theme next time?

Miss Cindy Butt-Cigarette Girl Extraordinaire

Well the Murder Mystery Party happened last night and it was awesome. I'm going to do a couple posts about how we made it happen but first I'd like to talk about my proudest achievement... my costume. I was assigned the character of Cindy Butt-Cigarette Girl Extraordinaire. I found these costumes online. But you know I like making stuff. So I thought I'd give it a shot. First off I went shopping at Target where I found a ruffly skirt in the teen department. I decided that I'd make shirt to go with it so I bought some ribbon, fabric and fringe and just sort of started sewing stuff together with no real plan. I ended up with a fairly simple idea. Here is my diagram of what I did.

The top is a long rectangle of silky fabric that goes all the way around my body (plus extra). I sewed two pieces of ribbon to the top to make halter straps that tie around my neck and two other pieces of ribbon to the sides that would tie in the back. The second picture is how it would look tied. I sewed fringe (the gray stuff) all across the top of the shirt to the bottom. But only on the front.

I wore the shirt and skirt together and added a blazer I had from the Gap. Since I was a cigarette sales rep at the Juice Joint, I thought I should look a little professional. I added black hose and some high heels and then the thing that I think really finished off the costume....The black wig. I ordered this wig online last week and it ended up being perfect. I added some bright red lipstick and black eyeliner. Then of course I had to have a cigarette box. I bought a basket on sale from Michael's and added candy cigarettes and some cigars my husband coerced me in to buying and then tied a ribbon on both sides so I could put it around my neck. Then I added some left over fringe from my shirt to some earrings for a finishing touch. The glue was still drying as we drove to the party.

And ladies and gentleman here it is...the finished product. Miss. Cindy Butt...who as it turned out is actually not that nice of a person or such a great saleswoman.

Uh, and yeah, guess who tied for the best costume prize? Thats right Miss Cindy Butt (who tied with Curly T's amazing rendition of a female Chief of Police). This is perhaps one of my greatest achievements in crafting thus far. I'd like to thank my husband for his unwavering support and Hobie for only running across the fabric like 7 times while I was sewing it.

But honestly everyone did an amazing job with their costumes. I had no idea that people would go all out for this but they did and it was awesome. Special shout outs to Beezus5 who cross-dressed for us as Mayor Biggs due to our lack of dude participation, B for his organizational, leadership and printing skills, and $hanzie for power hostessing.

Cindy and Private Investigator Pinkerton. I think they may actually end up together after everyone gets over the whole Murder situation.

Do you like my costume? Should I dye my hair black and get a bob cut? Do you think the PI and the Cigarette girl will end up together in the end?
Tomorrow I'll get with $hanzie and Curly T on how you turn a regular home in to a Juice Joint!