Rolling out the family jewels

As always, Halloween tested my sanity this year...we took on our most ambitious project to date, and it all started with Christmas shopping.

This year I bought Tess a few pieces of jewelry at a show that I attended. Worried that keeping it all in white boxes would be cumbersome I mentioned to Brandon that we ought to get her a jewelry box..."You know, the kind with the ballerina inside."

And since it was September and pumpkins were in our eyes my sister said the words that sealed our fate..."THAT would be an awesome costume!"

Indeed...but how?

One 35 year old army trunk, gallons of spray paint and about ten pounds of Styrofoam later we found out that creating a life-size jewelry box was no mean feat. In fact it was a major pain in the butt. We also had a rather unwilling ballerina who did not care for her bedazzled finery and was more interested in trying to see how many times she could throw her giant pearl necklace into the street. Being that Tess will be three years old next Halloween and will likely have ideas of her own I figured that this is my last chance to really do something major. (Indeed, she had plenty of ideas of her own THIS year but I didn't think that a monkey dinosaur would be all that easy to pull off either.)

But we perservered...we glued linings, we bought mirrors, we mounted the whole thing on wheels and VOILA! One functional, if not entirely cooperative roving Halloween float.

When I heard about the Parent Bloggers Network partnering with Blurb.com for a Halloween Costume contest I had to put forth the fruits of our labor.

Behold our creation:

Category Entry: Most Creative Costume


Category Entry: Best Handmade Costume


Category Entry: Cutest Costume (age 2 and under)


Thanks to Parent Bloggers Network and Blurb.com for sponsoring the contest and checking out our pics!