DailyBuzz Moms 9x9: DIY Kids' Hello Kitty Costume

I love Halloween, and I love costumes, and I got really super excited when Shae started talking about what she wanted to be for Halloween because, let's face it, I love living vicariously through her. Her Dorothy and Pirate Princess costumes? Total dreams come true for me. You better believe that if I could pull off twirly skirts and glitter shoes and pigtails right now at my age, I absolutely would.

Anyway. SPOILER ALERT: Hello Kitty wasn't Shae's first choice of costume. She wanted to be, among other things, Sleeping Beauty, Belle, Ariel, Tiana (at which point I sensed a theme a-brewing), a ladybug, a white cat, a black cat, a "ballerina witch cat," and our pet cat Hallie. In other words, she's four and she doesn't know what she wants, which is why she has parents. So I made an editorial decision and decided to buy her a Hello Kitty costume.

Here are my two major problems with the pre-made Hello Kitty costumes I saw in the store: (1) they were really, really trashy-looking (by which I mean "inappropriate," not cheap) and also (2) they want HOW MUCH? For THAT? That she'll only wear ONCE? Are they INSANE?

So -- another SPOILER ALERT -- I decided then and there that I was going to make my own Hello Kitty costume for her. Except, well ... I can't sew. Or draw. And I'm not particularly clever, really. But I am a human Garanimal, and I know how to take a couple of regular pieces and throw them together into something that sort of works. Also, by using regular pieces, I knew we'd be able to get our money's worth, because she'd be able to wear every single item in the costume many times, because they're all regular pieces. And it wouldn't end up costing much more than a pre-made (possibly less, because you might already have some pieces at home).

Without (much more) further ado, here is how I made -- more like "built," really, but still -- my own DIY Hello Kitty costume, in just ten easy steps, entirely out of stuff in the girls' department of our local discount department store (in this case Target, except where noted):

1. Start with one mostly-willing little girl in her great-grandmother's kitchen. (I recommend having bribes handy for this. We used candy because that always works with this one.)

2. Replace grotty sweatpants with new sparkle tights and shorts (model's own).

3. Add sparkle leg warmers. (Deploy bribes at this point if necessary.) NOTE: If desired, replace tights, shorts, and leg warmers with a pair of leggings (which I totally could have done but I didn't think of that first).

4. Add white tutu underlayer (model's own, re-used from 2009 and 2010 costumes).

5. Replace existing T-shirt with layered-look Hello Kitty tee. (Model will probably ask for water at this point, because it's taken about seven whole minutes to get to this point, and model is very impatient. If you indulge the model you might get some unexpected but totally appropriate sass in the remaining photos.)

6. Add pink tutu overlayer, held up with a hair clip or rubber band because the one you bought is accidentally a size too large. NOTE: You can use just one tutu, or any skirt that matches, really. (We were originally going to go with just the pink, but Shae remembered that we had the white one in the dress-up drawer, and who am I to discourage her from contributing to the creative process?)

7. Root around in your sister's purse for an eyeliner pencil because you forgot yours. Draw cat whiskers on cheeks. Add glitter spray to child's hair (optional, and not used at this time because, again, I forgot it).

8. Add shoes. Sequined shoes completely optional, but highly recommended, if this model is to be trusted.

9. Finish with cat-ear headband with Hello Kitty's signature bow added or, if you are glue-gun impaired (as I am), use a pair of Hello Kitty earmuffs.

10. ENJOY.

By my calculations, the total cost for this costume (including shoes) was about $45, which was more than what the pre-made Hello Kitty costume cost, but EVERY SINGLE PIECE of this costume will be re-used. (The shoes were the most expensive single item in this configuration, and I could have gotten away with regular old shoes, except my kid has giant canoe feet and needed a new pair anyway. Honestly, tall girls ...) Shae has already declared the T-shirt to be her "new favorite," she wants to sleep in the tutus (they'll be going in the dress-up drawer for future use if I can't figure out a way to turn them into a skirt for myself because, let's face it, it's pretty rad), and I basically had to hide the shoes to keep her from wearing them out before trick-or-treat.

Yeah, this one is a total winner.

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Disclosure: I received compensation to thank me for my participating in the DailyBuzz Mom’s Halloween Costume 9×9, but my opinions are completely my own

Workin' At The Car Wash

I can't explain what possessed my kid to wash a car in a tutu and a craft foam pilgrim hat.

I can't explain about 99.8% of the stuff she does, really, because it's been a really long time since I was four years old.

And in any case, I'm 100% certain that when I was her age, I was not even in the same universe of awesome as this kid.

I am just glad that she does what she does and lets me take pictures of it for the Internets.

Aren't you glad, too, Internets?

Oh and by the way, she managed to do such an excellent job washing her Pop-pop's car that she also got asked to wash Aunt Shelley's car.

But everybody knows that this kind of awesome is a one-time deal.

Work It, Girl!

I don't consider myself a stage parent, not really, although I do sometimes allow myself to entertain daydreams that Shae might someday get cast in a production of "Annie" or something -- a show that I myself auditioned for many years ago, when I was still young and cute and precocious enough to play one of the orphans and not old and bitter and miserable enough to play Miss Hannigan -- and sometimes I imagine that one of my Flickr photos will get "discovered" and Shae might be able to save up some extra money for college by becoming a local catalog model. I mean, she's a really pretty girl, and she wears her clothes well, even if (when left to her own devices) she does tend to accessorize everything with Crocs and silly bands.

The problem is, this kid is maybe the world's absolute worst fashion model. For me, anyway. Admittedly, I am no Mario Testino or Annie Liebovitz, but you would think that I could get her to smile once in a while.

Especially when she is wearing a very pretty dress that she loved trying on in the store. In front of those crappy-ass full-length discount store mirrors, under those god-awful fluorescent lights, when all I had was the cell phone camera that couldn't keep up with her, she twirled and spun and curtsied and grinned from ear to ear, her face lighting up like fireworks. At home, with natural lighting and a decent camera, it was like pulling teeth to get her to even stand up straight, let alone pose.

Well, okay, she "posed," but not in any of the ways I wanted her to. And there wasn't even anything good on TV at the time, just basketball.

I'll give her some credit -- at least she tried to smile. Sometimes. When she felt like humoring me. Which you can totally see in the gritted-teeth faces she makes.

But it's pretty clear to me that we have a LOT of work to do if I ever want to successfully campaign for her to be the Queen of the Rose Parade.

A Pirate Looks at Four

I am really bummed that the pictures I took of Shae's Halloween costume didn't come out so great, because I really, really liked it. It was happy and colorful and Shae was so happy and colorful as a pirate. But here are the best pictures I managed to get.

At school, just before the parade on Friday, eating ice cream. Because that's what all dread pirates do just before they go pillaging for candy, isn't it?

The skirt turned out really cute, and while I am disappointed in myself for not being able to take full credit (I ended up outsourcing the sewing to a co-worked, because it took me two hours just to sew a seam in that bad boy), I am nevertheless pleased with the results. Shae loves skirts that spin, and this one really does.

You can see how much she enjoys being in her costume. She wanted to sleep in her skirt both nights. We've thrown it in the toy box, along with the hat, so she can pretend to be a pirate whenever she wants.

Halloween night was kind of cold, so we made sure to bundle her up extra -- leggings and socks under her stockings, a turtleneck under her shirt, and a scarf under her hat. Although, technically, the scarf was there primarily to keep her hair from assuming a life of its own.

We made it to maybe two houses before we had to ditch the sword (it kept dragging on the ground), but here you can see the final accessory in the costume, the piece de resistance: the pirate skull candy bucket. Which fell apart at the end out our route and spilled candy all over some poor family's porch. While we were cleaning it up Shae took the opportunity to reach into their candy bowl and help herself to a few extra treats. Like a good pirate would.

So that was our Halloween. It will be interesting to see what I end up using for the calendar; unfortunately I just didn't get very many pictures of the pirate costume, what with the running amok at school factor on Friday and then the running amok in tricky lighting on Sunday. Add in the fact that it is nigh upon impossible to get a kid to sit still when the prospect of vast amounts of candy is heavy in the air, and we just couldn't get her to sit still. We had a great time, though.

Skinny Jeans

When I run the world, there are going to be rules, dammit: Hipsters will be sent to re-education camps until they learn the difference between sarcasm, irony, and general jerkishness. Phil Keoghan from "The Amazing Race" will be named Executive Emperor of Eyebrow Expressionism. And for the love of all that is good and holy, there will be stores that sell clothes in women's sizes 14-24 that (a) fit properly, (2) are made well, out of actual identifiable fabrics, and (iii) match each other.

You see, I had to go shopping this weekend, and I had a horrible terrible no-good very bad time, because NOTHING MATCHES, NOTHING FITS, and everything appears to be disposable.

I mean, look, I have a tragic case of unfashionability. I admit this. Most of my clothes are simple and basic and at least five years old, because while I love "Project Runway," I hate fashion. I hate shopping. I hate clothes. I need to wear them, of course, but if I had my druthers, I'd spend all my waking hours in plain turtlenecks, flannel lounge pants, and Christmas socks. You know, the kind with the cats and the glittery thread? You can hide all manner of figure flaws in granny jammies.

It doesn't help that I can't really put an outfit together. Honestly, I need Garanimals or something. My work clothes are more of a uniform -- black or tan pants, a couple of skirts if I am feeling inspired, turtlenecks in solid colors. If I wanted to do something kicky with my outfit, I would wear an interesting pair of socks or my saddle shoes. No ruffles, nothing too low-cut or clingy, straight legs, flats. I am boring. But because I've lost all this weight, none of my current supply of turtlenecks and pajama bottoms really fits any more, and neither do any of my "work pants," so I really needed to go shopping this weekend. And it was almost an absolute, unmitigated disaster.

True story: I spent more than an hour in a Lane Bryant Outlet this weekend, trying things on. I must have put on 25 pairs of pants and at least that many different tops. I pored through clearance racks, sale racks, and even (escandalo!) full-price racks looking for something, anything, to buy. I didn't want to buy much, just a few nice pieces that I would be able to work into what I already have that still fits, but I was willing to part with some hard-earned cash in exchange for some trousers that did not fall down as soon as I stood up and some blouses that did not make me look pregnant.

It did not end entirely well. I got two sweaters that are actually probably a little too big, but they are cute-ish and lightweight and I will be able to layer them with stuff I already have so at least I can make it to Christmas. I will keep looking for some more similar tops in different colors, because in my opinion the only thing better than a decent enough sweater is a decent enough sweater in five colors.

But I also got two pairs of "skinny jeans."

Now don't get me wrong -- these are not hipster-style skinny jeans, the ones that all the irony-impaired 20-somethings are wearing with their used bowling shoes and their $400 cashmere scarves and their trucker caps. But the jeans are skinny for me, tapered legs instead of being boot-cut clown pants, a full size smaller than I expected to need and three sizes smaller than the jeans I started with, and THEY MAKE MY LEGS LOOK FANTASTIC.

Yeah, I said it: I look FANTASTIC in my new jeans.

That's a big step for me, being able to say that I look fantastic in any way in anything. I definitely not Miss Mary Fashion Plate, and most of the time I am satisfied with not being a crumpled-up mess when I leave the house for work. Sometimes I will even settle for being a crumpled-up mess if I at least am not emitting visible smell rays.

But ... my God. I almost keeled over dead when I put those pants on, and I saw how good they looked. And I thought I was looking pretty good in the jeans I walked into the store with. It was my husband's idea to try on pants that were smaller than I thought I needed. To actually fit, really fit, into jeans that were a whole size smaller than I expected? That was an absolute revelation.

I still have a long way to go before I reach my goal weight, and I have a metric assload of self-esteem and self-image issues that I am going to need to work on along the way, but I am going to take this small victory. I finally feel like I am making noticeable progress, which is hard to see when you're losing two pound at a time. These are most definitely not "fat pants," or even really "transitional-sized." I bought a pair of jeans in a size that starts with "1" for the first time in at least 10 years. I'm not 100% sure, but I think weigh less now than I did when I got married -- and if I don't, I am pretty damned close. And I feel so, so good about it.

Never underestimate the power of a great pair of "skinny jeans."

Break in the Weather

It rained last week, and it's raining again today, but we had a lovely weekend and I got some really cute pictures of Shae with Marshmallow and Candy. Tomorrow I will reprint the story I wrote about the weekend, but I thought I would share some "out-takes" first. Just because.

On the one hand, she wanted me to take this picture of her outfit on Friday. On the other hand, I have no idea why. (Dig the sexxilous Christmas door mat / rug inside our front door. We're no longer behind the times, but ahead of them!)

For part of the time while we were at the playground, Candy was my photography assistant, which means I stuffed her in my bag while I was taking pictures of Shae on the teeter-totter with Marshmallow.

Accidental lucky pose. I wanted to try to encourage Shae to sit in the grass with the bears and pretend to have a little picnic, but preschoolers are like cats: you can't make them do anything they don't want to do, and sometimes they pee on the rug. Anyway, this picture is pretty and warm and a little sad, like a nice bright day at the tail end of summer, when you can feel the damp and the cold on the breeze. (Plus, teeny-tiny strawberries are cute.)

We had homework this weekend, too. I don't have much in the way of art supplies because Shae doesn't often want to get excited and make things, but I did have some chalk, glitter glue, and goo-goo eyes left over from the lobster Halloween costume from a few years ago (2005 or 2006, I think). It looked better when it was fully dry, of course, but it's not bad for a 3-year-old. She definitely strikes me as the chaotic-creative Jackson Pollock type, without the alcoholism and bipolar disorder.

Walk, Walk, Fashion Baby

Work it, move that thing, crazy!

This week I've started taking Shae to school in the morning, and sometimes she wants me to take pictures of her outfits. I don't know why, because I pick out most of her clothes and do her hair, but she's been very proud of how she dresses anyway, and she's been "posing" for me.

None of these clothes are new, by the way, but she says she feels "just like a princess." I don't get it either.

It's not really anything special -- she did wear a dress this week, yesterday, a really cute mod-style Children's Place number left over from last year, but she didn't want me to take a picture of that. Who knows why.

Apparently this Nashville Zoo shirt from when we went to Tennessee for a wedding in 2008 is her "very favorite." I don't know why. Maybe because it's yellow?

Today she was all excited about her outfit because it was raining and I had her wear her rain boots. Because what else are rain boots for?

I guess since this is going to be a daily thing now, I should start taking pictures with the good camera. Also, I should stop eating Triscuits, but that's a different problem. (And not a lot, so I'm not TOTALLY cheating on my diet, just "flirting" a little bit.)

Supermodel of the World

We took Shae shopping over the weekend, because when I wasn't paying attention for like 10 minutes last Tuesday evening she hit a rapid growth spurt and shot up like 6 inches in an hour or something and all of the sudden none of her clothes fit any more. Not even shorts that I bought back in May. What is it about heat and light and water and the Miracle-Gro that they are evidently putting in the food at school?

She does have a few things that we're keeping from last year, because I overshot how much she was going to grow over the winter, but we had to pack up a whole bunch of pants and shorts because this kid is all spindles. Her legs are almost as long as mine, and I am already a full-grown person. (Allegedly.) She still fits into some 3T's in the waist, but those pants are comically high-watered, or if they are shorts, borderline obscene. (Hello, baby booty!)

Instead of going to the outlet mall 10 minutes from the house, where we have had some luck in the past but not so much this time around (largely because stuff is FUGLY), this time we decided to go "old school" and visit the VF Outlet Center in Reading. When I was a kid I used to go there with my parents for back-to-school shopping, and I remember that I used to love it because there was always something different there versus what I could find at mall stores which I couldn't really afford anyway. One year I got a pair of Lee jeans that were purple and probably a size 7 and I loved them.

Here's the short version: those Outlets are not quite what I remember, and definitely not what I am used to. It wasn't a complete waste of time -- we got Shae three pairs of jeans for $4 each -- but it was very cluttered, crowded, and not all the stores were actually outlet stores, but retail stores in the outlet center. Which means I ended up spending more on some things than I might have if I used my Retail Ninja Commando skills at Kohl's or somewhere else.

But we did get a lot of stuff, and we didn't overpay too much, and like I said, we got jeans for $4, which is almost as cheap as free. I even got myself a pair of jeans for $6, which is definitely Not Too Shabby. (Especially because I plan on not fitting into them for very long.)

I wanted to put on a little fashion show where Shae can model all the cute stuff we got her, but she does not take direction and all she wants to wear these days is "princess dresses" and "Cinderella shoes" which simultaneously breaks my heart and makes me want to throw up a little. Princess dresses. Pshaw. I need to make sure that they are playing gender-neutral dress-up games at school because I'll be damned if I am raising a damsel in distress. Cinderella can put on her own darn shoes.

Anyway ... these are the best of the "model" shots I could manage. Her posing is ... weird, to say the least.

And her very favorite outfit? Was in a bag of hand-me-downs from my sister's in-laws.

It doesn't fit -- too small in the chest and shoulders, and too short -- but the good news is, her dress from my cousin Beth's wedding still fits, and I think that's what we're wearing for Christmas. Where people can actually SEE her in it, this time.

Parsons, We Have A Problem

I would really like to know what has happened to my beloved Project Runway. Because it really isn't a very good show any more. And I, like Tim Gunn*, am concerned.

Back in the days when PR was on Bravo -- and it feels like it was hundreds of years ago, now, but it was only two years and three seasons -- PR was groundbreaking television. It was not like many other reality shows at the time: it was, is, and remained about fashion. First, last, foremost, and pretty much only about fashion.

Sure, in a competitive reality show, you're going to have some interpersonal interaction, but this was not like Survivor or Big Brother. This was a show about making great clothes. Do, or do not. There was no negotiation, no politics. There was no "voting off the island." It didn't really matter whether the rest of the designers liked you or not; at the end of each episode, you either made good stuff and stayed around, or you made crappy stuff and got sent home.

Now, I am not not naive, and I understand that people are not cast for a reality show about designing based solely and entirely on whether or not they can actually design. But since fashion is a creative industry, and what with creative people being how they are, there has been no shortage of "characters" on this show. You might have heard of one or two of them: Jay. Wendy Pepper. Austin. Santino. Jeffrey Sebelia. Christian Siriano. Laura Bennett. My favorites, Chris March and Nick Verreos. Fascinating people, every one, but they didn't do what they did because they were "popular" or "players" -- they made it, or didn't, based on their clothes.

I still think that's the case with PR, but something has changed. The show switched from Bravo to Lifetime, and I really feel like the focus of the production has shifted from "interesting people making beautiful clothes" to "a bunch of big-mouths being nasty to each other and causing drama and sometimes making something that someone in the audience would wear." There has always been some drama and nastiness -- see: Wendy Pepper, mentioned above -- but when PR started the nastiness was shocking because it seemed like such an anomaly.

(Come on, Tim Gunn has got to be one of the nicest guys on Earth. Do you think he would have signed up for this if it was going to be all drama all the time? I sure don't.)

If I had to come up with an explanation for what drove the shift from "making high-quality television" to "making highly-viewed entertainment," I would say that it came when the producers and the network changed. Now the show is produced by Bunim/Murray, the same outfit behind The "Real" World (emphasis added), and the show airs on Lifetime, the network responsible for that cinematic classic Mother May I Sleep With Danger? starring perennial Oscar-bait Tori Spelling.

And please note that I say this from a place of love, because I used to watch The Real World religiously back in the day, and I actually kind of like Tori Spelling -- but these changes blow.

Now the show is an hour and a half long, instead of just an hour, and that extra half hour? Is nothing but the designers criticizing each other's designs and basic general bitchery. It's stupid and unnecessary. Nobody looks good under these circumstances. If these people were really that good, they wouldn't need a reality show on basic cable to get people to buy their stuff. And I assure you: there are only maybe three people on this show whose clothes I would actually consider buying, and one of them has already been eliminated.

I don't know that I really have a suggestion on how the show can be fixed. I would definitely recommend cutting out the extra half hour, and maybe going back to Bravo. But I'm not sure even going back to the original homebase will help; some of the stuff that we have seen on PR is slowly creeping into other quality Bravo shows now. I don't really care how much the contestants on Top Chef hate each other -- the more I have to see the giant egos interacting, the less I feel inclined to eat at one of their restaurants. I don't want to eat where the chef doesn't respect anybody but himself.

And don't even get me started on Work of Art, which was seriously an unmitigated disaster.

Maybe what I am saying is this -- Dear Project Runway people: If you're reading this (and I doubt that you are, because you are not my mother, so why do you care?), stop with the drama! Just make clothes! You're making Tim Gunn* concerned, and I don't like it. Concerny faces give me wrinkles. Thanks! PS - Stop showing the Schick Quattro razor-trimmer commercial during PR because I really don't want to think about the shape of other women's "topiaries." Eww.


* Tim Gunn is probably not concerned, but that is what he says all the time.

Who's The Happy Hana From Kamani-Wanna-Hula Bay?

(You win 3 million free bonus Internet points from me if you recognize the song title and can properly place the context. The points aren't good for anything, but they're free.)

Here we are, modeling the latest in beach-towel-sarong fashion. While eating a cookie. And standing on the step in front of our (great-) grandmother's sliding glass door. And absolutely NOT LISTENING to our mother who JUST WANTS TO TAKE A STINKIN' PICTURE, for the LOVE of GOD, why won't you just LISTEN to me?

And we are all, "So? Yeah? TALK already, lady. I have THINGS to do. Like EAT THIS COOKIE."

And also we are all, "Don't be mad 'cuz you ain't me."

And then I just give up, and WHATEVER, because at least ONE of them is looking at the camera this time, which is a marked improvement over what usually happens, which is that NOBODY is looking at the camera, PLUS someone is CRYING.

(PS - I have been advised by reliable sources {i.e., THE INTERNETS} that "hana" is a Japanese word meaning flower. Which makes sense, since the song is a faux-Hawaiian ditty featuring a ukulele and is about, I imagine, a beautiful Polynesian hula-dancing girl. Now watch me as I walk away ... away ... away ... awaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay ...)

(PPS - Yes, that was a clue if you hadn't figured out the song already. Here's another clue: 1987. Now that's it. Go figure it out, these bonus Internet points are burning a hole in my pocket.)

The Rachel ZOMG Project

Have you guys ever heard of celebrity stylist Rachel Zoe? Have you ever seen her TV show on Bravo? Did you ever consider, just for the sake of entertainment, subscribing to her daily newsletter, where she sends out fashion and styling tips that almost always feature some kind of ridiculously expensive thing, like "summer booties" that have 6" heels and are made out of gold lamé, chain mail, and kitten fur, or, to cite another recent example, designer leather cargo pants that cost $6,450? Seriously, check it out -- it is B-A-N-A-N-A-S.

Anyway. Every once in a while she puts together these "special report" guides to what she thinks you need for the season. Sometimes there is some cute stuff, sometimes there is some really weird stuff, sometimes there is stuff that costs more than the mortgage to my house. None of it fits me, of course, because I am not the same shape and weight as an asparagus, but everybody's got their something.

Why am I giving her all this free advertising? I don't know, really. She fascinates me in the same way that a train wreck or a giant fish tank filled with starving rabid piranha eating a cow might fascinate me. I can't wear any of the clothes she ever recommends -- she deals primarily in couture designers, so nothing comes bigger than a size 6 anyway, and when she makes a "real world" alternate suggestion, it's for an $800 knockoff of a $10,000 rug, and even that is out of my price range, you know? And I won't necessarily go so far as to say that she is outright tacky, but ... well, she's not always my style. Let's leave it at that.

She kind of inspires me in some weird way, though, so I have put together my very first "ZOMG Report" by me, Rachel ZOMG. We'll call this collection "Swing Set Summer," my own version of RZ's "Jet Set Summer" collection, and I'm featuring all the absolute must-haves for a preschooler on her way to the pool this summer:

"Your summer 'uniform' should be brightly colored to show the world how happy you are, but pack a T-shirt in your bag to cover up when the sun gets too hot."

"Earn your wrinkles the old-fashioned way: by laughing! Look great while protecting yourself from the sun's harmful rays. Yard-sale vintage accessories are always in."

"Keep your pedicure neat and protect your polish poolside with these snazzy water sandals. Use the squirter to keep yourself cool while you walk along the beach letting everyone admire your sun-kissed glow."

"Dry off, and then dry out ... and keep warm with this snuggly cover-up poncho that features ironic snow-skiing illustrations. One of the best yard-sale finds ever. I DIE!"

"Hold yourself (and your stuff) together with this totally cute bag that is big enough to hold all your necessities, with room to spare for books and games."

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Hey, maybe this celebrity stylist gig isn't so bad after all. Anybody know any famous people who shop at Target and Dollar General? I have a pitch for them.