My mother also loved roses and birds.  She must have planted more than thirty roses of all different hues and fragrances around the perimeter of our home.  The smell of roses in the air would almost knock you over on a lovely spring morning.  In a way, the rose, could actually be an analogy for my mother.  She could be very beautiful and engaging on the outside, but she definitely had her thorny side. I think she loved birds because they were free to spread their wings and she always felt tied to her responsibilities.

In June of 2002, Mom became ill at the nursing facility where she was being rehabilitated from a recent hospital stay.  They rushed her to emergency at the nearby hospital.  When I got there she was being her worst prickly self, acting rudely to the hospital staff as well as to my sister and me.  I decided to give her some space and let her cool down before I went back to visit her the next day.  I didn’t even know what room they had put her in, so I had to call the hospital to find her.  After seeing the condition she was in, I felt really bad that I had not come sooner.  I spent the next two days over the weekend by her side in her room because the nurses seemed to have abandoned her.  By Monday, she was being quarantined and her vital signs were slipping.  After the last three years on and off in several different hospitals when I didn’t think she would survive, this was the one time I thought that she would be back in the nursing home recuperating.  It had been a painful journey for both of us and now it looked like it was coming to an end.  The nurse suggested I find a hospice to help ease my mother’s last hours in a more pain-free state.  I opted for the one within the hospital to cut down on moving her too much as she was in extreme pain.  With my husband at my side, we walked by my mother as they wheeled her bed downstairs to the last room she would ever see.  The birds outside the windows were singing especially loud and I watched Mom try to turn her head to see them. As we entered the hospice, the nurse informed us that Mom’s room was ready. My husband and I looked at each other and smiled.  Somehow my mother had intuitively known that the last day of her life would be spent in room number “five” also known as the “rose” room at 5555 W. Thunderbird Road.

A highly anticipated video game with the original cast of Ghostbusters and realistic animation was also released the same day. 

June also heralded the 20^th anniversary of Ghostbusters II.  Now the fans are just waiting for Ghostbusters III to be made and they will be in Stay Puft marshmellow heaven!

The Arizona Ghostbusters did their part at the nearest Game Stop to help collect donations for the Salvation Army and promote the release of the video game.  A blow-up movie screen was on hand to view the film as the Salvation Army painted kid’s faces, provided popcorn, and “pet slimers” for a dollar.

Ghost in NH cemetary?

I told Todd it kind of reminded me of when people see the Virgin Mary in a tortilla or just recently a couple claimed that one of their Cheetos looked like Jesus. These people named their new found prize “Cheesus.” Todd huffed and thought that sounded disrespectful to our savior.  I was surprised, yet kind of proud of my son’s reaction only because he never had any real formal religious upbringing and I didn’t know if he felt the deep reverence Christians have for Jesus.  Somehow, I had instilled this in him without really trying.  As I was patting myself on the back, Todd came back in the room and said, “Well at least they didn’t call it  “‘Jeeto’!”

 Hats can really add to the completeness of a costume.  I have made outfits for frontiersmen, renaissance,  and pirates.  None of which would have looked finished without a hat. In some cases, I was only required to make hat when the rest of the costume could be pieced together from thrift store items or forgotten old clothes.

For example, in both of my son Shaun’s student films, he did not have the budget for a complete wardrobe so in order to set the theme, I made hats. In the Chupacabra movie (see Family page), Shaun needed a pith helmet for the main character to wear in a jungle scene.  Trying to find one was not easy (although later we learned our next-door-neighbor who was a mail carrier had one), so I formed one over an inflated balloon out of paper maché, white glue and cloth strips. Khaki fabric was cut and sewn to fit the molded pieces.  I spent a lot of time watching and rewinding scenes from The Mummy in order to get the look that Shaun wanted.

The next film, Atlantis 2032, needed Russian hats for several of the players.  After making a slew of coon skin caps for Shaun’s Boy Scout troop, this was a less challenging project. The pattern was basically the same as the coonskins only I needed to add “dog flaps” to the sides and an emblem to the front to distinguish it as a Russian hat.

Up close and personal these hats did not have that professional look, but on film they passed.  For any costuming in the future, I’ll have to up my game for the new high definition film.

Hot, sweltering weather is the norm here in Glendale, AZ.  I just can’t wait! Oh yeah, I guess I don’t have to because it was already 102 degrees last week. 

Well I know I should be making costumes, but before it gets excruciatingly hot and sweaty around here, I need to get my patio cleaned off. Besides, I can always sew with the air conditioning cranked downed to 80 degrees (recommended temperature, more like 75 degrees for me).

I am working on a few posts, but need to get some things together first.  In the meantime, I am on Starling fledgling watch as I wait for the new babies to emerge from the tree only to be chased to their deaths by the three cats that live outdoors.  Hopefully, I will get there as the birds emerge before the cats get them in their sights.

Actually, David was the one who figured out how to put an avatar picture up first.  Man! I was surprised to see his picture with his comments the first time.  I looked all over the registered profile page to see where one adds a picture for their avatar, but there was nothing.  Wow, I thought this guy was really magic (most of the time he is), but then found out that he had just received an email about gravatars.

What is a gravatar?

“A gravatar, or globally recognized avatar, is quite simply an image that follows you from site to site appearing beside your name when you do things.”  And of course, as far as I know, this is the only way to get a picture on your comments and it is a free service.  Therefore, go to http://en.gravatar.com/ and sign up.  You will be able to then go to any Wordpress blog that allows pictures and see your own unique self when you post a comment.

For Halloween this last year I wanted to display a pirate flag.  The book Pirateology had a design I really resonnated with.  These are the colours of a fictious female pirate by the name of Arabella Drummond.

The pattern was a hand drawn copy transferred to Wonder-Under and ironed onto muslin fabric.  It was then easy to cut out and iron in place on the black fabric.  I sewed a running stitch about 1/8 inch along the muslin edges.  The skull and swords pattern appears on both sides of the flag.

A couple of years ago, I had the opportunity to make a pirate costume for a friend, David, who had always wanted one.  Although I was responsible for the majority of the clothing, it was a very time consuming project.  Therefore, I thought it would be more fun to have David work on some of his own props.

As soon as The Halloween Express stores (www.halloweenexpress.com) were open we decided to scope out the various pirate pistols and swords. The sword was from Disney’s Pirates of the Caribbean line of costume accessories.  It is about 32 inches long and has a really nice heavy plastic sheath.  Unfortunately, I don’t think it is still available for sale anywhere.  Hopefully it will make a return when the new movie is finished.

David bought a couple of pistols and quickly disassembled them to sand any imperfections in the molds.  After putting them back together, modeling putty (I think JB Weld might work better) was applied to fill cracks and holes that shouldn’t be there. With various latex paint mixtures and David’s talented eye for modeling replicas, he had some really nice looking prop pistols.

The sword, on the other hand, was a little more involved as it had a sheath cover that needed sewing.  That was left up to me.  I will cover the makin’ of the scabbard in the next post.

This group is a fan based costume club, but what makes them really special is their spirit.  I am not talking ghostly spirit here, but charitable spirit like in doing community service work for many of the organizations helping children and families.  These guys are not paid for their services and spend countless hours of their own time attending events and collecting donations for many charities.  The Arizona Ghostbusters are committed to not only having Marshmallow Man-size fun, but to making a difference in the lives of many people.

You won’t need Ecto Goggles or a PKE Meter to find these guys, just go to www.arizonaghostbusters.com and look for their next upcoming event!  See them in California at San Diego Comicon 2009 in July!

How much a costume you make at home could cost quite a bit depending on what your costume is and whether you choose to take advantage of cost saving methods in building your costume. 

Fabric can probably be one of the biggest expenses you might have towards the garment, but it doesn’t have to be. Look for fabric remnant stores, shop the internet, and use coupons and sales at local retail stores.  When JoAnn’s Fabrics is offering forty to fifty percent off coupons weekly through either their stores or online, it is just plain foolish not to use them.  You can have them mailed to your house and emailed to you by signing up at www.joann.com or any JoAnn’s location.  The Sunday’s paper usually has a flyer with coupons for the week (coupons can be used for other things besides fabric). I know other retail stores have these kinds of savings, but in Phoenix we have lost a lot of our competing fabric stores.  Check the stores in your area. I find remnant stores to be a better value than retail because you can buy some fabric by weight instead of per yard.  The down side here is that you may not know what kind of fabric you are buying or how to clean it. Todd (AZspidey) and I bought over 6 yard of 60 inch wide material for about $16.00 for his purple joker coat.  Remnant stores also have sales.  That much fabric at a retail store would have cost us at least $60.00 without a coupon or a sale at JoAnn’s (if we could even find the type of fabric or color we were looking for).

Obviously a costume can cost as much or as little as you want to put into it.  The point here is that a great looking costume does not have to cost a fortune, be smart about buying the materials and do it yourself.  If you just can’t sew or can only make parts of the costume yourself, think about bartering for services when you don’t have the money. Buying clothes from a thrift store is a great way to jump start a project also.