Halloween

This Halloween was rather strange... I didn't trick or treat, and we didn't carve pumpkins. However, I did finish my Elf costume! William, Nicholas, and I all were Lord of the Rings characters!

The pictures were taken on Dad's camera, and they wound up with Grandma (since Dad is staying at Grandma and Papa's house during the week while he's commuting until we move), and she edited them and put them on facebook. Of course, these aren't all the pictures, but let's just call it a teaser, shall we? Someday I would like to do a true photoshoot. :)

Frodo, smoking the Longbottom Leaf of Hobbit fame as he stares, ponderously, into the distance. (Note that the Ring of Power is around his neck!)

< Frodo, in a very epic pose. :)Nicholas wore his Easter outfit from last year (I was the one who pointed out that the vest was quite the Hobbit style!), a cloak made by Mom, and the Ring of Power (from Ben's Lord of the Rings Risk game) around a chain.

Strider, a Ranger from the North

Elendil, king of Gondor and Arnor

Aragorn, son of Arathorn

< Aragorn, prepared to charge into battle. William saved up his money to buy a real (albeit unsharpened) sword- a replica's of Aragorn from when he was still known as the Ranger from the North (in other words, not the sword of Narsil). It is a very nice sword. William wore a "chainmaille" shirt found at Goodwill, a fake leather tunic made by Mom, jeans, Mom's boots, and a homemade cloak. He stole my Evenstar for the costume, and I also made him "The Ring of Barahir" (aka Aragorn's ring).

^The only picture of my cotume you'll get to see for awhile! I made the costume (jewelry included!) entirely by myself. Well, Mom helped me figure out the sewing pattern and she sewed the collar on. But other than that!

Okay, so Ben was just too funny. He sat there with the thing of candy, and would randomly start talking or moving. We got several screams!

Three our four people read the "Mean Ogre" sign. They read it aloud, and as they were finishing, Ben cried indignantly, "I'm not mean!"

The funniest incident was probably with a few teen girls. I didn't get to see this one, but from what he said...

The two girls walked forward and read the signs.

"Should I grab some candy?" (in a tone of surpressed horror)

"I don't know, its probably a person tricking us."

"I dunno, it doesn't look real."

"You get the candy."
"I don't want to."

"Is it real?"

"Let's throw a rock at it and see."

As you can imagine, Ben was rather concerned that they would chuck a rock at his head. Instead, they threw a bag of candy at him and then ran away without getting the bag or the candy from Ben. !!!

Marcus was originally going to be King Theoden (or at least, a king with a sword and all, us Tolkien geeks named him Theoden), but he wouldn't wear the costume. So he was a firefighter instead.

Adelynn was the most darling little pink bunny rabbit EVER!

Elvish style jewlery

So... I have always loved the clothing and jewelry in The Lord of the Rings, Narnia, and other movies similar to those. I've always especially loved the Elven style. I fact, I love everything Elvish. I am hoping to make an Elven dress if we can get the supplies. It would be blue and silver... Anyway, I have always wanted Elvish style jewelry. Way back in 5th grade, I got an Evenstar necklace (for $3, when it normally was $10!)




(It's not as nice as this one- this is the "official" $100 diamond one)

I also love "medieval" "fairy" or "Celtic" style jewlery, which I dub as "Elven" since it really looks alot like it. :)

Since it is virtually impossible to find anything like this in Rolla, and even if you did, it would probably be very expensive, I decided I would try to make some for myself. I HATE WAL-MART. Let me say that again: I HATE WAL-MART. They took away 3/4 of their fabric, but their worst transgression is the fact that they have deprived their art section of anything of worth. Once upon a time you could find beads and wire, embroderiy floss, random craft sets, paints of all kinds, etc. Now all you can find are: premade bead necklaces, some scrapbook supplies, cheap kids crafts sets, and wedding decorations. I HATE WAL-MART.

To get to my point: There are no other craft supply/hobby stores in Rolla that I know of. (Unless you count that moldy one downtown). I had to deal with a small Ziplock baggie of leftover beads from old projects and thin floral wire. At a garage sale I found a small spool of thicker wire, but I already use it up in these projects... Dad had a pair of needlenose pliars that are really helpful.

My first attempt that didn't fall apart:

 

I was actually fairly proud of this next creation. I'm calling it an ear cuff. Sounds funny, I know, but what else should I call it?

Here is how it is worn:

(random girly thing- my hair looks curly in that picture! And not super frizzy... :P)
I think you would probably only wear one of these, and you can wear earrings with it, too.

I made these before I made the ear cuff I made "earrings" for Adelynn. She simply loves dress up and has been deploring the fact that her ears aren't peirced (keep delporing for 5 more years, Rosie!)

 

I also made a rock necklace:

This was laying on my desk, and so I just had to take a picture of it. I can't claim credit for this one: Rebecca made it. :)

 

Maybe next time I should lay a piece of white paper underneath when I take the picture...

Crocheting

Guess what I've recently fallen in love with? Crocheting.

The above are pictures of my in my beret. :) It was my second real crochet project. Its so fun! It was also the very first time I used an actual crochet pattern. I used an old 1936 pattern I found online. It is very simple and easy:

Beret

Ch. 3, join in a ring.

Row 1: 6 single crochet in ring. = 6 sc's

Row 2: 2 single crochet in each stitch. =12 sc's

Row 3: *Increase one by working 2 single crochet in next stitch, 1 single crochet in the next stitch. Repeat from * around Row. =18 sc's

Row 4: *2 single crochet in next stitch, 1 single crochet in each of the next 2 sts, repeat from * around row. =24 sc's

Continue to increase in this manner (1 extra stitch in every x, x+1, x+2, etc.) 6 times in each row, until work measures 10 inches in diameter. (You have just crocheted a circle). Work even for 1 inch. Then decrease by skipping every 10th st. in each row until hat fits desired head size. Work 2 rows even. Break yarn and fasten.-Minerva Yarns 1936

 

Nick looks like a mushroom from Mario Brothers in it. :) I had to really twist his arm just to let me take this picture.

 

It didn't take any arm twisting for Marcus to wear the hat! He actually stole it off my head. He is so cute!

What was really funny was that I wore it to garage sales this weekend. Some random lady asked if I had made it, and asked me for the pattern!

Mom thinks I should put a pom-pom on it. :P

Adelynn, of course, had to have a hat, too. As has been the case with most of my projects, I simply made it up as I went along, the result being that it looks very 70's and is lopsided. :) 

She loves it, though.

 

So does Marcus, apparently.

I had made William a Gryffindor scarf for his birthday. Of course, Nick had to have something, too. So I made him a hat (which takes 1/1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 of the time, lol) Here is William wearing his scarf and commandeering Nick's hat: