Preparing for a Halloween Cruise
Things my Mother taught me:
1) how to cook, which I appreciate,
2) how to clean a toilet, which I don’t, and
3) how to sew on a button.
With those skills in place I decided that I was fully qualified to design and execute our costumes for our Halloween cruise on the NCL Spirit with Aquafest. Packing for a cruise always takes a little extra planning but when you’re also packing for a Halloween party plus five theme parties, the word ‘packing’ takes on a whole new meaning.
First of all, we aren’t the creative costume types. The process of thinking about our costumes started months ago. I’m a musician and Mark has a great eye, but neither one of us got the gay gene for costume creation
The first two problems we encountered were where do we get the extra luggage for the costumes, wigs, feather boas, make-up, etc and how much are those damn baggage fees going to add up to? That’s where Goodwill and Southwest Airlines entered the picture. We purchased an extra piece of luggage at our local Goodwill for only $8.00 but unfortunately it came with a nasty odor when one opened it. Nothing a few squirts of Lysol can’t cure. By purchasing our airline tickets through Southwest, all of our beads and glitter are flying free!
Speaking of the glitter, we’ll never get all of it out of the carpet and the dogs keep trying to eat the leather scraps I bought for $1.00 per pound.
The first two theme parties I decided to concentrated on were Pirate Nights and Egyptian Night. The Disco theme is automatically taken care of since Mark has always accused me of being stuck in that era. If you don’t believe me, just take a peek in my closet.
For pirate night I found the perfect ruffles to sew on a shirt but the shirts were too perfect and too white. Mark rolled his eyes when he came home and I was mincing back and forth between the kitchen and the back deck with an enormous roasting pan, about 75 tea bags and two oversized white dress shirts to soak. I figured the tea would give them that Errol Flynn patina. You young guys can look that name up on Wikipedia.
I dried the shirts and began sewing on the ruffles, which went fairly smoothly. Luckily the inside of the shirt won’t show because this is the worst job of sewing anyone has seen since my first lesson with ‘Sewing With Nancy’, or so I thought until I began Mark’s shirt. I operated on the mistaken impression that since my shirt went so smoothy I would be able to sew on his ruffles exactly like my Aunt Grace. She could sew, cook dinner, watch TV and nurse a baby all at the same time. I’m not lactating but figured I could do as well as she.
I got home with 4 yards of ruffle only to be told rather abruptly that the colors didn’t match. Instead of coming home with an off-white that worked for my shirt, I’d picked up a stark-white, wedding-gown virginal white, which of course we all know wouldn’t work for Mark.
Back to the no-returns-policy fabric store. By the way that place is terrific. With an inexpensive and wonderful selection, the place is the size of a Costco. In case you need to know, SAS fabrics in Phoenix has the best selection outside Mumbai for material to make Saris. I thought about going as Mother Theresa, then remembered that she didn’t wear a Sari.
I returned home with the correct ruffle this time, no virginal white. We were watching reruns of RuPaul’s Drag Race for some costume fashion tips when I realized I had sewn the ruffles of his right sleeve on upside down. When will I ever learn that 3 glass of wine and sewing just don’t mix?
Now it’s on to the Egyptian collars which I need to make ready for all the “precious stones” I picked up at SAS. Wish me luck so we don’t end up looking like a dog wearing the dreaded “Cone of Shame.”
Mike is discussing. 
Mike 3:54 am on September 30, 2011 Permalink |
An entertaining read. Smiles and chuckles.