Happy Halloween!

I know I said I'd have pictures of my Halloween costume up yesterday, but when we got home from the Halloween party, we came home to this:

Thanks, nor'easter in October!

We spent the morning (and part of the afternoon) turning that mess into this mess: 

By the time evening rolled around I just wanted to sleep. ;-)

Anyway, here's my Amelia Pond costume in its entirety:

Just pretend my hair is the same color as what was on the box.

And here I am with my husband, the 11th Doctor (and his brand new sonic screwdriver):

Since I put so much effort into my costume, I decided to dress up again to hand out candy to the trick-or-

treaters tonight, but sadly not a single one knew who Amelia Pond is. :-(

Oh, and Glen was filming a segment tonight for his November show at SteelStacks, so this is the type of scene trick-or-treaters were likely to encounter:

Tyler and Mike, two of the show's writers/correspondents.

Something tells me this is going to negatively impact the number of trick-or-treaters we get next year.  Or just completely change the demographic. ;-)\

Handmade Halloween: A Retrospective

Ever since my first Halloween, I've had a long-standing tradition of wearing handmade costumes.  This tradition was started by my very talented mother, who made all the costumes from my early years:

Me as a witch in 1984. 



Me as She-Ra in 1986.  One of my absolute favorite costumes ever.

Sometimes I'd make costumes completely on my own, with no intervention from my mother:

This is what happens when you leave a not-quite-8-year-old to her own devices. In case you couldn't guess, I was a Martian in 1990.


And sometimes, your Catholic school decides that the only way students are allowed to wear costumes for Halloween is if they dress up as saints:

Here I am as Kateri Tekakwitha in 1993. 
I designed this costume based on illustrations from a biography of her, and my mom sewed it.



Fast-forward to fall of 2003, my junior year of college, and the She-Ra costume returned, this time made 100% by me.



That's my good friend Jency as Harry Potter on the left. 
And that is definitely not an alcoholic beverage in my hand 1 month before my 21st birthday.

I kind of cheated in 2007.  I didn't actually MAKE my costume so much as cobble it together from things I found in Halloween stores and things I already owned.  The skirt and boots were already in my wardrobe.  I bought the wig, pitchfork red fishnets and t-shirt.

You can't see it in this picture, but my t-shirt says "I feel a sin coming on."  Classy, I know. ;-)



This year I've returned to the grand tradition of a proper handmade costume.  The only element I purchased from a Halloween store was the hat, which was still modified.  Everything else was thrifted, already in my closet, or made from scratch.  Also, I returned to the grand tradition of asking my mom for help.  Here's a little sneak preview:

Doctor Who fans will probably guess that my costume is Amelia Pond.  My husband already dresses like The Doctor most of the time, so his costume mostly involved updating his sonic screwdriver to the 11th Doctor's, since until this week he only had the 10th Doctor's.  We'll be attending a Halloween party this weekend, so expect pictures before Sunday's over. :-)

Are you going to any Halloween parties?  What are you going as?

Cherry Truffle

Usually when I dye my hair, I opt for Natural Instincts in Cinnaberry. My natural hair color is medium to dark brown with red highlights, and Cinnaberry gives those highlights a nice little boost without looking unnatural.

However, I needed to go a bit more red for my Halloween costume this year, so I went with a L'Oreal color called "cherry truffle."

Also, I switched brands without doing a patch test 48 hours before dyeing. I like to live dangerously.

My hair's still wet so I can't share the results just yet, but I'll definitely post photos of my new hair color (and my Halloween costume!) after this weekend.

Oh, and the craft show this past Saturday went pretty well! This one was well established and there was a decent crowd, so I made a pretty good profit for the day. And I processed my first credit card purchase! It's kind of silly how excited I was about it. My next show is November 11, so here's hoping I make lots more sales, credit card or otherwise! ;-)

UPDATE: While my hair is redder (more red?) than before,it's more mahogany than cherry truffle. I managed to take a quick picture between jobs tonight, and you can see that it's actually quite red where the light catches it.

I guess this means I'll have to spend a lot of time directly under bright lights during the party on Saturday?? ;-)

Historic Haunts

Last night, Glen and I went on a Halloween-themed double date with some friends. 

The Historic Haunts ghost tour departs from the Moravian Bookshop in Bethlehem, PA: 

The tour guide took us to various historic sites around downtown Bethlehem and told us stories about ghosts that supposedly make appearances at those sites.  Regardless of whether you believe there's any truth to those stories, the tour was full of interesting historical information, and we got to see some gorgeous old buildings.

Here's a photo of the tour outside the Sun Inn:

Please forgive my finger in the upper left-hand corner.  I still haven't quite mastered taking pictures with my iPhone without blocking the lense. ;-)

Anyway, the Sun Inn is actually going going to be on Ghost Hunters later this year.  Apparently the T.A.P.S. folks were there a few weeks ago.  I've only seen a handful of episodes of this show, but I just may have to tune in to that one to see a local landmark!

The tour ended back at the bookshop, where there was hot apple cider.  We ended the evening with dinner and pumpkin ale at the Bethlehem Brew Works. 

Elvis is getting into the Halloween spirit, too.  Here he is napping on the couch and snuggling the monster squeaky toy Glen got him this week:

What have you been doing this month to get into the Halloween spirit?

Shameless Promotion (and Elvis Update!)

My second craft show of the season is this Saturday:

It's also the first craft show where I'll be able to accept credit card payments!  If you're in the area, stop by and say hello. :-)

I'm also going to shamelessly promote my husband's monthly show at SteelStacks.
Here he is promoting the show on SteelStacks Live!


The next show is November 6 at 8:00pm.  Also stop by this and say hello!

Last, and certainly not least, Elvis' blood work came back okay!  He hasn't had anymore seizures, either.  He did have a brief stint on Valium to prevent future seizures, but oddly enough it made him hyper.  More hyper than usual, that is.  He spent 1:30am - 4:30am Tuesday morning wandering aimlessly around the house and getting stuck on furniture.  It was a long night.  Needless to say, we discontinued the Valium after that. ;-)

One Sick Puppy

Last night officially goes down in history as one of the scariest nights of my life.

Around 1:30 in the morning Elvis had a seizure.  It took me a little bit to figure out what was going on.  It couldn't have lasted more than a minute or two, but it felt like an eternity. :-\

Glen and I thought it might have something to do with the antibiotic he's on for a skin infection, since we normally give it to him every 12 hours, but due to his reluctance to eat his breakfast until 4:00 in the afternoon yesterday, he got two doses in 6 hours.

The vet was pretty insistent that two doses in 6 hours wouldn't cause an overdose, but either way we're going to be extra careful about evenly spacing his antibiotics for the remainder of the week.

Here he is in the waiting room at the vet's office with Glen this afternoon, waiting to get some blood work done, and looking handsome as ever:

This guy has cost us quite a bit of money over the past couple of months.  He's lucky he's so cute!

We won't get the results until tomorrow, but I've been a nervous wreck all day and will probably continue to be so until we know what's going on.  They're checking his liver and kidney function to make sure neither of those are what caused of the seizure.  Apparently it's not terribly uncommon for dogs to have one or two seizures and then never have another one, with no indication that there's an underlying cause, so we're keeping our fingers crossed that this will be the case with Elvis.

I know he'd love it if you went on over to his Facebook page and sent lots of good thoughts his way! 

Highs and Lows

Fortunately, this past week has had more highs than lows, but it started on a bit of a low note.  Namely a general lack of sales at the craft show, despite lots of compliments on my jewelry and lots of people taking my card.  Oh well, you win some, you lose some.  And who knows, maybe some of those folks will show up at my other craft shows later this season and decide they need to buy some Christmas gifts! ;-)  Seriously, though, I have found that the closer a show is to Christmas, the better my sales seem to be, so hopefully that will hold true again this year.

Overall, I was pretty happy with my display, although I feel like it would look better with more of the busts for necklaces. The necklaces look so much nicer that way, and it seems a bit sparse with only three.  I think I need to make it a point to pick up a couple more next week.

My big high note for the week was finding out today that I got accepted to that juried show I was talking about! 

Other good stuff from this week included lots of hours at the library (including 4 more tomorrow afternoon!), finding out my dog is going to be interviewed at the super cute blog Coffee with a Canine, and my decision to finally join the 21st century and get an iPhone. 

That last decision was prompted by the fact that with an iPhone I can accept credit card payments at shows using Square, which just takes a percentage of each sale, with no monthly fee.  Since my business is pretty seasonal, it just didn't seem worth it to pay montly fees when I only do shows maybe 4 or 5 months out of the year.  An added bonus is that going to get the phone this weekend will also give me a chance to finally take advantage of the discount my employer provides with AT&T. 

I'm off to work on some much-needed signage for my jewelry display (including one saying I accept credit cards!).  Tomorrow I'll be going to the farmers' market, working, and getting dressed up and going out for drinks with my husband.  What are your plans for the weekend?

Let the Fun Begin!

Craft show season kicks off for me this Saturday at the Alpha Volunteer Fire Company, 10:00am - 3:30pm!

I'm definitely excited to see what shoppers think of my new display, and hoping it helps me make lots of sales! 

It's going to be a very busy couple of days leading up to the craft show, though.  I'm spending Wednesday - Friday at a government auditing seminar (gotta get those CPE's!), and I'll be working at the library tomorrow night, which leaves not nearly enough time to prepare for the show.  Wish me luck. ;-)

P.S.  I went to DSW over the weekend.  They didn't have those wonderful shoes in my size.  I hate ordering shoes online, but I just may have to do it this once.  I did, however, have better luck at Macy's last night, where I picked up a super cute pair of ballet flats marked down from $70 to $34.50.  Plus I (ok, my mom) had a $10 coupon.  So I guess I can't complain too much, huh?