Cheerful Halloween

Want to make you own cheerleader skirt? Here's how...

For an old fashioned two-toned cheerleader skirt get too colors of fabric. Measure your subject to see how long you want your skirt. Make sure to add about an inch for the bottom hem and 3-4 for the top elastic band.

You will need enough of the purple fabric to go around your subject twice, and enough black to go around once. If you want to skip the zipper (which I did) give yourself a bit extra of each so the skirt can be slipped on.

Cut both fabrics into 6 equal pieces. When cut, the purple pieces will be twice as wide as the black pieces.

Sew all the pieces together (purple, black, purple..) joining at the end to form a very large circle. Hem up the bottom to get that out of the way.

Divide each purple panel in 4ths by measuring or folding and pressing. Fold the purple panels over so that the first fold of one panel meets the third fold of the next panel. Pin these in place until you have the whole skirt done. Stitch around the entire top of the skirt an inch or two from the top.

At this point, if you want a zipper, install it now by cutting a panel and sewing it in, or ripping out a seam and putting it there. Otherwise, sew elastic into the top hem of the skirt and you are done.

Our costume was completed with a black tank top, some dollar store pom poms and some ribbons made from extra purple fabric.

Halloween is almost here.....

I can't wait. I finished our Cleopatra costume yesterday. We will try it all on and take pictures this weekend. Stay tuned....

Don't forget to visit my shop...

Etsy Buy Handmade RissaReWax

Back in Time

A few years back my oldest wanted to be a "sock hop girl" for Halloween. This costume was soo simple.

I took an old curtain and made a large circle skirt with an elastic waist.

I found a color page with a picture of a poodle. I traced the poodle onto a piece of white felt.

I then hand stitched the poodle onto the skirt with black thread. I wanted the poodle to have an outline in black. I then stitched the lines that were supposed to be on the inside of the poodle.

Using black yarn, I made a leash for the poodle that circled around and up the skirt. The yarn was sewn on with black thread.

We finished it off with a borrowed sweater and a pony tail. Her hair ribbon was more of the curtain fabric used for the skirt.

Total spent? Zero!

Tinkerbelle

This Tinkerbelle costume had to be on of the cheapest ones yet. We didn't care for the frilly poufy Tinkerbelle costumes you could find in the stores. They didn't look quite right.

I found a little green nighty at Goodwill. After getting it past the creepy-feely check-out guy, I took it home and took it in on the sides, stitched up the front so it was less revealing, and shortened the straps.

Next came the wings. We had some left over from a previous fairy, I just spray painted them blue.

Finally the shoes. I found some cheap slip-on shoes for like a dollar and died them green. I then raided our craft cabinet and found little poof balls in blue.

Some tights to keep warm and a pony tail completed the project for a very realistic looking Tinkerbelle at around six dollars.

Holier than Thou

Two years ago I was a nun for Halloween. This Mother Superior costume required a lot of sewing. The main gown of the Habit was a long black gown. I made mine, but a graduation gown or something from a witch or grim reaper could be used.

Next came the white collar. I used a pattern I found for a quaker type costume and widened the collar. The collar attached in the back with a single sew-on snap. You could also use a white foam craft sheet. Attached to the collar with sew-on snaps was a long black rectangle of fabric.

For the head piece I used a white sheet of craft foam. I cut out a rectangular strip that wrapped around my head to just behind my ears on both sides. To this I sewed another piece of the black fabric cut into a large square. I stapled elastic to the two ends of the foam strip so it would fit around my head.

The finishing touches included a rope I tied around my waist and a rosary I made myself from beads I already had. The big cross was made for me by my grandmother a few years ago.

Here is a picture of me and my coworker Candy. Obviously she was an evil vampire goth chick or something. Though we tied for first place in the costume contest, good eventually won over evil. She still has the cross burn on her forhead to prove it.

Halloween is comming!

I love Halloween! Not really the candy and parties but the costumes! I love the process of coming up with the ideas and finding a cheap way to make them!

For the past 3 years my middle daughter has been an indian. The same indian all three years. I got so excited when she told me this year she wanted to be Cleopatra!

In celebration I will be posting a few past costumes with pictures and instructions while I work on her new costume.

Today of course will be the indian!


For my little indian I started with some fake suede from the fabric store. I used a shirt as the template for the top. It fitted like a vest and was all one piece. I didn't want to have any stitching so it would look more authentic. I cut long strips on the sides and front. The strips had wooden beads slipped on about every third or fourth one. The strips were then tied together to form the top.

The bottom had to be sewn. I made a simple skirt with elastic in the waist. I then cut a long rectangle of the fabric. This also had long strips on both ends. Beads were put on some of the strips.

The long fabric went from the outside of the skirt in the front, down the belly inside the skirt, between the legs, up the back side, and back out of the skirt. This gave the loin cloth affect, but still had her covered with the skirt.

For the shoes we used a pair of flip flops she already had. I used brown yarn and a large sewing needle. I sewed more of the brown fabric onto the flip flops. The yarn was actually passed through the sides of the flip flops and then through the fabric. The tops were wrapped around the ankle then tied on with more brown yarn.

The head dress is a simple brown stretchy head band with some feathers stuck in.

She made her own arrow pouch with a piece of leather cord and an old wrapping paper tube.

The final year my husband made her a bow from a stick in the yard. He made a notch in each end of the stick and tied string to one pulled it until the stick bowed and tied it to the other end.

Total spent? Around 10 bucks on the fabric.

It's Hip to be a Clown

Once a year, the bank where I work takes a ranch full of foster kids out to eat. They come to the beach for a week long vacation and different parts of the trip are sponsored by different companies and people.

We do dinner one night and a group of us dress up as clowns to paint faces and make balloons. This is something we look forward to every year. Below is a short video of 2009. Check out my YouTube for 2008 as well. If you are looking for me I am the fat one! :)

Draw A Card - Last "Life" Size Board Game post

When a player lands on a "Draw a Card" space, they have to preform a silly act. Our party was for a little girl turning 8. We wanted the things to be easy silly things to do that would be slightly embarrassing, but not hard. Here is what our cards said.

Tell us your best knock-knock joke
Do your best ballerina pose
Do your best silly face
Rub your head and pat your belly
Do your best Parent Face
Spell your name backwards
Act like Scooby-Doo
Do your best, loudest burp
Be an Opera Singer
Say “Rumplestiltskin” three times fast
Bark like a Dog
Do your best Ugly face
Stick out your tounge and touch your nose
Do the silliest thing you can think of
Sing the Barney Song
Hop on one foot
Sing the Sponge Bob song
Act like your Teacher or Principal
Sing the A B Cs
Be a little Teapot
Oink like a pig
Moo like a cow
Act like an airplane
Crow like a rooster
Cry like a baby
Make your best mouth fart
Do the Chicken Dance
Act like Elvis
Meow like a cat
Be an Elephant
Dance like your Dad
Do a tap dance

We printed each thing on a 3x5 index card. Put an adult in charge of the “draw” pile so the players don’t have to move from their places. We either handed the card to the player or read it allowed.

Have any additional ideas for the cards? Reply to this post.

Board Set-up for "Life" Size Board Game

Continuing on with the instructions for a "Life" size board game here is the board set-up I used. To make the set-up a bit easier, I have written all that we did down:

You will need 33 cardboard “spaces” labeled like so:

1 Start
1 Finish
1 Spring Break
1 Get a Job
1 Catch a Cold
1 Get Married
1 Honey Moon
1 Have a Baby
1 Vacation
4 Move Forward 2 Spaces
4 Move Back 2 Spaces
4 Move Forward 1 Space
4 Move Back 1 Space
8 Draw a Card

This is the order we had the cards in. I wanted to be sure that no one would end up in a perpetual circle between forward and back spaces.

Start
Move Forward 2 Spaces
Draw a Card
Move Back 1 Space
Draw a Card
Move Forward 1 Space
Spring Break!
Move Back 2 Spaces
*Get a Job
Move Forward 2 Spaces
Catch a Cold!
Move Forward 1 Space
Draw a Card
Move Back 1 Space
Draw a Card
Move Back 2 Spaces
**Get Married
Honey Moon (eeeewww!)
Move Forward 2 Spaces
Draw a Card
Draw a Card
Move Back 1 Space
Move Back 2 Spaces
Move Forward 1 Space
***Have a Baby
Move Back 1 Space
Move Back 2 Spaces
Draw a Card
Vacation!
Move Forward 2 Spaces
Draw a Card
Move Forward 1 Space
Finish!

*The “Get a Job” space had a table next to it. On the table were all the ‘jobs’ that players could pick from.

**The “Get Married” space had another table with the veils and ties.

***The “Have a Baby” space had a cooler with all the water balloon ‘babies’.

Remember, the players all had to carry their; jobs, marriage, and babies without dropping them. They also had to roll the huge dice.

Feel free to mix it up, add or subtract all you want! Got a better idea? E-Mail me and I will add it to this page!

Make Your Own Die (Dice)

It took a little thinking to make my "Life" size Die so I am sparing you the trouble and posting instructions:

Cut two equal pieces of white fabric. They should each be about three times as long as they are wide with a quarter inch seam allowance on each side.

Each piece of fabric will be folded in three sections. See the picture for how the pieces will match up for sewing.



It is best to leave a whole side open so you can sew your dots on.

I’m Seeing Spots!

Every die needs it’s dots. To make mine I traced our drink coasters. They just seemed to be the right size. You will need 21 dots (or more if you loose them like me!).

I just sewed mine directly on each side. It is probably easier to sew them on before you put the die together, but I wanted to be sure I got them on the right sides. Another option is to use No Sew and glue them on!

Remember when placing your dots, that opposite sides should equal 7.

When all that is done, just stuff it and stitch it! It took about 2 bags of stuffing to do mine. Of course this will vary with size.

Does all this seem to complicated? E-Mail Me to buy mine!

How to make your own "Life" Size Board Game

We had so much fun with this project!

My husband came up with the idea to have some kind of board game for our youngest daughter’s birthday party. So with some brainstorming, we came up with a game that was somewhat similar to “Life”.

The object of the game is to get to the end, that’s it. But you have to do it carrying your ‘job’, ‘spouse’, ‘baby’, and while throwing a huge die!



Here are the instructions for building your “Life” Size Board Game:

Items needed:
Large Die (Dice)
Lots of cardboard
Water balloons
Several household items for “jobs”
Toole and stretchy head bands
Foam craft sheets and yarn
Cards (Draw a Card)
Goody Bags for all the winners

“Life” Size Die
I made my dice with fabric and stuffing. Check back later for my instructions to make your own die!


If you want to go the easy route, you can purchase some fuzzy dice or something for a smaller version.

Cardboard
We collected old cardboard boxes from work for about a week. You can also go to a local store and get some. You should have 33 large squares of cardboard for the ‘spaces’ on the board. Each space will be marked with something. Check back later for my board set-up.

Water Balloons
At some point in the game each player has to have a baby. Their baby will be one water balloon. Sometimes during play they will have more than one baby, they still have to make it to the end of the game without breaking their ‘baby’! We drew funny faces on our ‘babies’! (At the end of our game the kids had a blast popping their ‘babies’ on each other’s heads!)

Jobs
Each player will have to choose a job during the game. We picked out items from our home to represent each job. They have to carry their ‘job’ with them for the whole game!
Examples:
Hairbrush - Hair Stylist
Pool Float - Lifeguard
Microphone - Rock Star
Book - Librarian
Hose - Firefighter

Toole and headbands
During the game each player has to ‘get married’. For the girls I cut small pieces of toole (2 foot by 2 foot). These were attached to their heads using some dollar store headbands. Elastic would work too (but the girls got to keep the headbands when the game was done).

Foam sheets and yarn
When the boys got married they got a tie instead of a veil. We cut out ties from foam sheets and tied them on with yarn. (For some reason the boys didn't want to keep these after the game, hmm.)

Cards
Various spaces around the board were “Draw a Card” spaces. Check back later to see what I put on my cards!

Goodie bags
I made simple cloth bags from canvas. We filled these with little card games, chocolate coins and some other stuff. Have fun finding things that have to do with the game of Life and board games in general!

Rissa is Blogging!

Wow, so I gave in and started a blog. I am basicly starting this up because Yahoo is killing geocities. Right now you can view my web page at: http://www.geocities.com/rissarewax/. You can also visit my Etsy page at www.RissaReWax.etsy.com

My Etsy page is filled with handmade crafts. Most of the crafts I made, and the puzzles were made by my grandmother. I like to do just about any craft I can get my hands on and will always be listing new things. Right now things are a little slow because I take classes over the summer.

To get things started, here is a video of my dog Daisy stuck in pants pocket.


Check back soon for more!