Off-List Item #1: Sew Halloween Costume

Denial is a lovely shade of taupe.

So, I have reached the point in my semester where I literally don't know how all the work I have to do is going to get done. I freaked out a little bit earlier, but now I've wrapped myself in the warm, comfortable confines of denial. Deep, deep denial. It's sort of like a chenille blanket, woven from indifference, angst and a wee bit of idiocy. And here I am, blogging instead of writing the bobillion papers I should actually be doing...


As I was walking to work today, I was thinking about my list. I'm super, super excited about all the stuff on there (well, maybe except the TV-free for a week thing...but I'll put that off for a bit) but I realize that a lot of it requires some level of planning, or at least some forethought. But since the whole 30 Before 30 thing is about trying new things, then I figure, why not celebrate the somewhat-less-monumental-but-still-new stuff that I do? So I present to you, my new "Off-List Items" feature...


Dressing up for Halloween is one of my favorite holiday traditions, and yet one I put an astonishingly little amount of effort into preparing for. I remember Halloween my sophomore year in college, when my roommate Caitlin and I had plans to go to Zanzibar in DC for their costume dance party (please, somebody understand how shady this is). I recall a lot of brainstorming of brilliant, even genius, costume ideas. And yet I also recall going to the picked-over Halloween costume shop at the Georgetown Park mall the night before, and purchasing an overpriced red feathered-and-sequined headpiece that I wore, with heavy eyeliner and a black outfit, as my costume the next day. I have absolutely no idea what I was, though I guess in retrospect "Half-Assed Atlantic City Showgirl" was probably about right.

What has 2 thumbs and hates Drew Carey?

Grad school has done something for my costume-planning abilities though, because last year I went to the craft store and actually fabricated my own costume (see picture) in advance of Halloween. Though slightly cumbersome at bars and parties, it was generally a hit, especially among game show enthusiasts generally and Bob Barker fans specifically. 


So yesterday, I was back at JoAnn Fabrics, this time with my friend Lindsay in search of the perfect tulle. Are we going to be ballerinas, you ask? Nay, nay my friends. We are going to be loofahs. It's been a dream of mine since seeing a few pictures online a couple Halloweens ago...though according to the undergrad who was ALSO buying loofah material last night, and is allegedly organizing an army of 19 year old loofahs in her house, this idea is super on trend this year. Thank goodness, too...at 29, I'd hate to think I'd become a Halloween fuddy duddy.


With human-sized loofah fixin's in hand, we retired to Lindsay's apartment to get all sassy Christian Siriano with her friend's sewing machine. Now, I mayyy have misrepresented myself slightly when I told her I "know how to use a sewing machine". By that I mean, 20 years ago I made a dress for Samantha, my American Girl doll, in a kids sewing class in Hudson, OH. But I refused to let this sewing machine get me down...I grabbed the manual and set to work learning what a "needle" and "thread" and "stitches" are. But seriously, I learned how to thread a bobbin. And wind a bobbin! I didn't even know what a bobbin was until last night! Accomplishments!


Then I took the nude-colored stretchy material we bought to serve as the underpinnings of the loofah, and I sewed us two of the ugliest, most ill-fitting tube dresses you could possibly imagine. But it was a start! I began with a piece of fabric whose edges were not connected and ended with a piece of fabric whose edges were connected. BOOM. Now we just have to pin all the tulle onto the dresses and hope that the result is decidedly loofah-ish. 


And if it isn't, I'll just have to defer my Project Runway application until next year.