Quest: Halloween Costume, part III
Outcome: The victor hasn’t been officially declared. I accomplished half my trials, now there is one more party to go.
On top of just making a costume for the Halloween Party, I’ve come dangerously close to pulling my hair out actually planning the party. Filling 2 1/2 hours with Halloween activities vaguely related to English and able to be done by 20+ children ranging in age from 5 to 10 is rather difficult. Luckily the last bit of the costume (that I was going to finish for the kids’ party) was just making my chaps, which would be loosely sewn to a pair of jeans. I was going to sew black felt onto the white felt to make the cow hide pattern, but I thought that would be a lot of work, and I discovered I actually didn’t have that much felt. Instead I pulled out my acrylic black paint and a fan brush and went to town. I think I like the result even better, as it has a more fur like appearance.
So I painted the chaps one night, then went shopping the next day for party supplies and ended up spending 5000 yen (about 50 USD). I don’t know how it ended up being that much, I walked in intending to spend about 3000 yen. I’m pretty much a miser. Somehow I developed a guilt complex that kicks in whenever I feel I’ve spent too much money. I was so depressed I didn’t do anything else for the party or my costume that night and instead, after having a skype conference with the social events organization committee I head, I just read a story by Edgard Rice Burroughs (author of Tarzan.) That was Thursday night. The party was going to be on Saturday.
Friday night was a dark time for me, please ignore the bad pun. I had to basically do all the party prep, sew the chaps to the jeans (the easy part) and stay up late getting stuff done with the knowledge that I wouldn’t be able to make it up because my weekend was pretty much a parade of non-stop going. (O_O);
I actually managed to get everything done, and the weekend didn’t exhaust me as much as I thought it would. My poor left hand however was a casualty of several unfortunate events. On Thursday I sliced the tip of a finger while preparing dinner. On Friday I played volleyball with some students and managed to really bruise my thumb. Friday night I blew up 24 balloons for the party and filled them with candy and stickers. While tying 24 balloons, I managed to scrape off the skin of my middle finger in two places. And then while using the hot glue gun, I wasn’t looking at my hands, and my right side must have had it out for the left because I managed to stab my thumb just above the bruise with the tip of the hot glue gun. I don’t consider myself an artist, but I have a feeling when someone refers to an “artist’s hands” they really mean horribly scarred.
Saturday came and went with barely a hitch. Remember those 24 balloons I blew up? They made it really difficult to pack everything into my car, while leaving the back seat open for my friend and her two kids. I couldn't see out my left side mirror, but we and the supplies all got to the community center in one piece. All the kids recognized me as a cowboy (I then taught them cowgirl) and a few girls even recognized me as Jessie. I think it went well. I'm really fortunate that my friend, another American living in my town, came to the party. She brought her almost 3 years old son, and baby girl. Luckily the baby slept the entire time, so my friend could help control the kids, especially during the transition times between activities when the kids want to run wild. Her son (Spiderman) also managed to completely show up the rest of the kids with his natural English. When asked which stickers they wanted, skeletons or pumpkins, most the kids just pointed. Spiderman points and says "I like this one."
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