Halloween Costume Construction

 As is tradition, Amelie picked an obscure Halloween costume that A) we can't find at the store and B) none of the people passing out candy will recognize and therefore C) she will want to explain it in a complicated way to them. BUT it is a spooky, great character. 

She wanted to be Hornet from the video game Hollow Night (on the left). She roped James into being the Hollow Night himself (on the right) -- even though Sam had already ordered a Sonic costume for Leah and Leah thought James was going to be a Sonic character with her! The drama! 

Here's another inspiration photo of some other folks who went all-out on this costume: 

After some input from a cosplaying friend, we made giant papier-mache heads on top of balloon-and-styrofoam frames (for Amelie) and 10 cent pool noodle horns for James. It was a multi-day process. 

Don't they look thrilled? 

I used the hacksaw to cut a wire hanger in half, which provided the correct bend for the pool noodle horn. 

We painted the heads in the garage and used some of the giant piles of cardboard from moving to make their weapons (a needle and a nail - I think!) Since those are supposed to be silver, we just wrapped them up with duct tape. 

There was a woman selling various capes for $5 each on facebook marketplace and James and I took a trip to pick two of them out down a long gravel road lined with creepy Halloween decorations. And then Amelie suggested that I sew a pipe cleaner into the collar of the red cape & I figure she can just wear it backwards. I mistakenly thought that the Hollow Night character had a black cape (despite the reference photos I had!) and no one corrected me. 

The kids helped quite a bit with design and construction and painting them white out in the garage. One of the neighbor kids even came over and slapped some papier-mache on with James. 

Here's one photo from Halloween & I'll put the rest with the regular Halloween post: 

And! There was ANOTHER Hollow Night trick-or-treater who came to our door! His homemade costume head/mask looked like it was constructed with a craft foam sheet (so maybe not as polished looking, but much lighter-weight). The kids had abandoned their heads by this point, but I should have asked for a photo!