Raggedy Ann Meets Her Match

Did you think Halloween was over? Seriously??

HA.

It isn't. I have one more party to go to tomorrow, and this one is themed (boo), and it has a stupid theme (feel free to join in on the booing, anytime). The theme is...wait for it....wait for it....

1930s Country

Boooooooooooooring. Go ahead, google it. It isn't impressive, at all. The only thing that would have been interesting historically in the U.S. at that point was the Depression, and I thought of it too late to make a potato sack dress (which would have been inaccurate, anyway--historically, they were usually made of flour sacks). I might change my mind and do it anyway if I somehow find some free or really cheap burlap today, but I doubt it. Actually, my creative juices seem to be awakening right now (I just realized Orphan Annie dates to this period, too), but I don't really have time to do anything that will take me more than, say, 30 minutes to do or make. 

So what am I doing?

I'm going as a rag doll, a la Raggedy Ann, without the cap, since I don't like how it looks. Anyway, it is cheap, and I have most everything for it. The only things I am lacking is a yarn wig (which is easily fixed--I'll tell you how Monday) and an apron. I already have decent shoes, and blue skirts/shirts/dresses, so everything should take off without a glitch. 

Hey, it is either that or I adapt my Phantom of the Opera/Addams Family Member costume and go as a widow. A yarn wig sounds more fun. 

The Easiest Costume of All: The Phantom of the Opera

Happy Halloween!

My costume is simple and short, just as this post is simple and short. What am I? If you haven't figured that out, well, that's your problem.

What I'm using:
1 Black Dress
1 Pair Black Stockings
1 Pair Heels
1 Mask (trimmed to fit my face appropriately)
1 Eyeshadow Palette
Spirit Gum
Foundation
Lipstick

This costume has gone through several different variations, including a test run several years ago that is pictured above, but I finally settled on this one mainly because I didn't have the time or money to make a black velvet cloak, and I need something that can look professional again in seconds (normally, I have a class that I can't look weird for in the middle of my day, but other factors have led to that being absent today, mainly working on a project with some theater friends). Obviously, the first three items are quite intuitive in their use, as are probably the last two. However, the rest I, of course, had to mess with.

The mask is actually what I did the most with. This phantom piece was actually inspired by a friend, who commented on the fact that I never had a profile picture that included my entire face. I had mentioned it to my mother because I thought it was funny, and then forgot about it. A week later I was doing some serious shopping for my classroom, and my mother comes up to me with this silly grin on her face and something hidden behind her back. It was a Phantom mask. It was a buck and change, so I threw it in the cart, and then got out the scissors and edited it. It came down to a sharp point along the chin, which I didn't like, especially since it was too small for my jaw, so I rounded that off, and then I lowered the forehead (it was ridiculously high--there might have been a reason it was so cheap!), in the process removing the little stretch band that goes around your head. Now you know why the Spirit Gum is important!

The eyeshadow palette actually helps hollow out my cheek a bit more and give the more unearthly look. A little white powder along the cheekbone never hurt, either. I think I've yet to actually use that eyeshadow on my eyes yet. Foundation helps with blending this out, and the lipstick gives the final touch--you may or may not want to use this, since in my opinion lipstick is messy and I don't like eating it. Incidentally, the average woman consumes something like seven pounds of lipstick in her lifetime. Ew.

The Perfect Cat Face: An Index to Cats, Cat Costumes and Catiness

As I have now post pretty much all the cat costume related stuff I've written/done (but not everything I've planned), I thought it might be helpful to post links to all of the information in one place. Please do keep in mind that the majority of this information was researched and developed while I was working on a Gia the Jaguar piece, but the basic information can be adjusted to suit your individual needs and plans. As I continue developing more cat costume techniques and post pictures of work I've already done, I will update this index to include links to those posts, too.

Creating Cat Eyes
Creating Patterned Fur
Easy(ish) Cat Whiskers
Various Cat Costume Ideas

Planning Halloween

Halloween is, truth be told, actually a bit of a taboo holiday in my household. Due to my heritage, I have a heightened awareness of Halloween's darker side, and can trace it back to its roots loooong before it was enforced by little costumed children demanding candy. Thus, growing up, it was never a celebrated holiday, and I still don't quite feel comfortable with the idea. Still, I've come to attend the occasional harvest party or join my friends in wandering the campus in strange clothing. This year I happen to plan on doing both. My campus friends and I split down the middle for sweet/scary costumes (we currently have a Belle, a pin-up zombie-turned-I-forgot-what, and me), and the harvest party is themed.

I hate themed parties.

This particular party is hosted by a darling family that has a wonderful home, but the people in charge of picking the theme (not members of the host family), come up with some of the most boring ideas. There was the Old Retirees theme one year (I didn't go to that one, and no zombies were allowed anyway), the Nerd theme last year (I apparently annoyed people by thinking outside the box and doing a Alice in Wonderland Nerd costume, ie, my Mad Hatter), and this year happens to have the theme of.... Country.

Moooooooooooooooooooo.

Still working on inventive, non-farmer and non-cowgirl ideas for that. I really doubt I'll be able to find someone for the other half of a cow costume. Which I don't have.

Using Wish: What It Means For You

During my sabbatical, I spent a good amount of time learning about www.wishwall.me. Unlike Pintrest, which seems to only waste time to me, I can see a use for Wish. Here's why.

What is Wish?

Wishwall is pretty simple. You scroll through, find things you like, and wish for them. These things get posted on your WishWall, and you can put them in files and other various things. So far, to me, it sounded exactly like Pintrest. But! With Wish, you can save money.

How Do I Save Money with Wish?

Why, I'm so glad you asked! For everything you wish on, if you recommend it to three friends, you get a 10% discount on that item. After you purchase an item, you send a copy of your receipt to Wish, and they send a reimbursement to your PayPal account. Pretty nifty, huh?

If you add items, you can also get discounts, and Wish runs various deals with different sellers so you can get even higher discounts and other goodies. I actually realized that this was website was worthwhile when I got a surprise $3 off of a $12 item I had wanted from etsy--previous to that, I had signed up and then ignored it.

Is There a Catch?

No, no catch. They do cap how much you can get reimbursed or as bonuses from the site to $100 a month, though. Personally, I think it would be rather hard to hit that limit. Also, I have tested the system, using the chemise I recently bought as a test item for it. I did get the full 10% reimbursement.

Cool! What About You?

Yup, I get bonuses if enough people like my stuff--or, rather, I get higher percentage discounts. But you love my blogging, so you're ok with that, right???

Anyway, I will do my best to add all the products I blog about on here to Wish, and give you links to it. At the very least, if you want to buy any of these items, you can get a 10% discount on it. Also, I pretty consistently add products to Wish that I think are cool, but don't necessarily fit into my blogging scheme--books being one of those items. I would highly recommend signing up for Wish, and, once you do so, please follow me. Feel free to browse through the stuff I've liked or added--I think you might find a few gems in there, too!

Tainted Loves is not responsible for any damage to keyboards due to drooling while browsing.

Custom Made Undergarments: The Perfect Chemise

Chemises are one of the few items that I have put off buying for forever and a half. They are necessary for so many different costumes (of which fact I am reminded about 80% of the times I get into one), yet I've been lackluster about buying one. Why? Well, I'm not exactly average shaped. And yes, I did say buy, not make. I have a rule that, if I fail at making a piece the first time, and I can't figure out why, I will never attempt to make it again, and I will always buy it. You'd think I'd be able to manage sewing such a simple garment, but trust me: I tried. It was a disaster. I'm never trying again. 

In the interim, I have used a variety of different button down shirts as substitutes, and they've worked okay, but they definitely gave my pieces a more modern look that I didn't necessarily like. Finally, I took the plunge and began scouring etsy for a good chemise that didn't cost an arm and a leg. It took my quite a while to find something, and waffled around about buying it. Finally, I did. 

The chemise came from a shop called Dungeons, Duds N Jewels. What attracted me to this shop in the first place was the pretty lace on the chemise. The price wasn't bad at all, and the little "Custom Made" line made me quite happy, especially since I wanted a shorter-than-normal one. I went ahead and ordered the Lace Insert Chemise, and after a few emails back and forth over measurements, got the message that the package was on its way. 

And then the post office took forEVER to deliver it. The shop owner, Ellie, had been kind enough to send me the link to track the package, and I swear that the post office sent it every which way just to frustrate me. In reality, it probably didn't take that long, it just seems like it. As it was, I was all sorts of hyper and bouncy when I finally found that dear package in my mailbox. I, of course, opened it right away and had to try it on, and it fit marvelously. My hyper self then spent a good fifteen minutes running around the house alternating between flapping my arms and pretending I was an angel and staring at myself in the mirror and thinking I needed to do a Vampires of Venice cosplay. 

Long story short, I will definitely be getting another one, and longer. 

The Blog That Got Left Out In The Rain

My dear, dear readers (if any of you have survived!),

I am so very sorry to have abandoned you, especially for the icky scholastic season. I have had so many things flying around in my brain to tell you (my muse has been quite hyperactive), but taking 21 units is stretching my life to its fullest. With this said, I am returning to the blogosphere in the hopes of being able to renew my resolve to post at least every other day, if not daily. If I was truly organized (which I am not), I would be rebooted this on the first of the month, or something else pristine and orderly.

I didn't. Instead, here I am, with a brain and closet full of costumes and events and giveaways and all sorts of other cool stuff. Perhaps we can build something nice. I hope to be able to give the blog a new look to reflect the new content, but that may be a while in coming. My current goal is simply this: To manage to post three times a week, starting next Monday.

With love,

Wren