Flop or Flourish

     I haven't posted anything for a long time. Not because I haven't completed any projects, but it's been a crazy few weeks. I began a new job as a teaching assistant and I've been working on a few events for our church.

     One of those events was our annual Trunk or Treat. The weather this year was much colder than last year, so we decided at the last minute to move the event inside and do a more "Booth or Treat" kind of thing. We so need a better name for this...

     This year, money for costumes in our family was, well, non-existant. Creativity is the friend of the frugal, so I had to come up with a plan.

     Ally had already planned on doing a cheerleading trunk to promote our annual LCF Sports Camp. A cheerleading costume alone just didn't interest her though. She thought it would be fun to look like a cheerleader Barbie in a box. Tall order, kid.

     Her father made a trip to Lowe's for some appliance boxes. All of them had already been cut apart, so we used some large pieces. First, Daddy cut what would be the front panel into a shape like a Barbie box she had. Then he used other pieces and duct tape to form a box that would fit our tiny cheerleader. We still had some pink paint leftover from when we painted her bedroom. Yes, her walls are hubbabubba pink. She has a pretty sweet looking pink/black room. I painted her headboard, dressers and desk with this pink/black combo. (Maybe I'll post those pictures later.)

...So, about two coats of the paint covered the duct tape. I wanted the font to look close to an actual Barbie font, so I googled it. I found a site that had an actual vintage Barbie font. I typed each letter into word and made it as big as the sheet would allow, and printed them onto cardstock. Scissors and an exacto knife helped cut the letters out.

 

 For the inside lining, I used some leftover wrapping paper from last year's Christmas. She already had the outfit and pom poms from Sports Camp. Total cost of this costume? Here, I'll give you a breakdown...
Cardboard- $0.00 - Lowe's
Paint- $0.00 - My garage
Font Letters- $0.00 Google find
Costume- $0.00 Her bedroom (probably bedroom floor, if we're being specific... I'm just sayin'...)
Total- Yep, you guessed it, $0.00

Absolutely gorgeous! All night, people asked to get their kids' picture taken with the "Barbie doll girl." I think this is her favorite costume she's ever had.

 

Little sister was not to be outdone. Now, most little girls want to be a princess, butterfly, ballerina, or something else really girly. But my little girl has a big personality. And her personality wasn't fitting in a foofy skirt this year. (Although, she would wear that foofy skirt any other day of the year.) She wanted to be an iphone. I tried and tried to offer her other ideas, because seriously, how do you make a kid look like an iphone? But she was insistent. So, leftover cardboard was back for round two...
Daddy taped some rope and made up a sandwhich board type setup. Black paint, duct tape and more google made this girl incredibly happy!
(I know, she's not your everyday gal, is she?)
Daddy and her Papaw gave up the Apple stickers they got in the package with their ipads to contribute to the costume. Her Sunday school teacher brought her a pair of headphones and "plugged" them into the duct tape.
You may be wondering about the random red bandanas. Well, the ropes rubbed on her neck a little, making her itchy. So she got creative and grabbed some bandanas and tried tying them around the rope. Needless to say, this costume didn't last the whole night. She got irritated when she was trying to play games and it bumped around on her, but her back up plan worked out pretty well. She had a Supergirl costume underneath! Like I said, the kid has personality!
Cost breakdown... I'll spare you the details and just skip to the point. $0.00 total cost!

I have to say, I love my creative, unique little girls!