Parent and Child/Mummy and Baby costumes for Halloween or Fancy Dress

Okay so with Halloween only a few days away I have started thinking about costumes again and it occurred to me that this year I have a whole new person I can dress in a costume. Is it terrible that I am really excited to dress my little bundle in all kinds of matching outfits with me? Probably...

I don't have super exciting plans, by that I mean I'm not going to any parties, as I'm away with my family staying in a little cottage in rural Northumberland. We are going to spend the evening playing games and watching movies. However, that doesn't mean that I won't have a silly outfit to wear. I'm also going to North East Comic Con in November so I will be cosplaying there with the little 'un so I have spent far more minutes of the last few weeks thinking about costumes than I really care to admit.

A few years ago I did posts on science themed costumes and couples costumes, so this got me thinking, what were good options for fancy dress if you have a baby or toddler? Could they be at all adapted for family costumes?

Star Wars

By far the most popular choice I seemed to encounter was for the Star Wars fans. Most people who travel with a youngling tend to have a baby/toddler carrier so an interesting option is to pop a Yoda hat on your baba and you can dress as your own character. In theory it should be Luke in his training outfit, but if you want to be someone else then why not! I've also seen really cute baby crochet Leia buns so your baby could be Leia too!

Star Wars is really easy to adapt into a family theme as there are so many interesting and unique characters to choose from.

Image property of Star Wars and Disney

Labyrinth

One of my favourite ideas, probably because I've loved labyrinth since I was a very young child. Buuuuuut I would be lying if I said I didn't have a bit of a Sarah phase in my teen years. This would be a great costume of you are short for time or cash, you simply need a stripy sleep suit for your little one and a pair of jeans, baggy shirt and waistcoat that could easily be find in vintage shops or on ebay. If you wanted to step up your game to you could also have ago at a Jareth outfit or even Sarah's crazy prom dress.

Image from Labyrinth Wiki

Flintstones

They are the modern stone age family after all. I've seen some okay looking Flintstones costumes online (although not in real life) so you could be Fred, Wilma, Barney or Betty and your little one could be Pebbles or BamBam. I also feel this would make an excellent vintage costume instead with a blue or while 50s/60s dress and a cute baby romper, although this would be a little bit harder to source.

 

Image from Flintstones Wikia

Nintendo

If you're wanting to do something a bit different (but not that different) you could go for Nintendo characters. With Mario Kart 8 having lots of baby characters it would be very easy to dress your little one as a baby Mario or Luigi with dungarees and a coloured t shirt or vest. Luckily it it's really easy to find grown up dungarees at the moment too so it would be easy to dress up as either of these too. You can also go a bit more hard core too if you wanted to make our buy a princess dress.

I've seen some really cool looking Pikmin hats on etsy too so you could always have your baba as a little Pikmin.

With Pokemon Go being so popular a duo of Ash and Pikachu could be an option too and since there are nearly 1000 pokemon now so you have rather a lot of choice.

Image from Mario Kart 8

  

DC/Marvel

DC and Marvel are on fire at the moment so there are tonnes of ready made baby and children's outfits out there. Places like Mothercare do lovely little baby onesies and it could be a quick and easy outfit for baba and there are so many adult superhero fancy dress costumes that you won't have trouble finding something to match.

Image from Pinterest

Disney

In a similar vein to the super hero option the Disney store (and others) have loads of baby costumes and they have even more for little girls and boys so you are completely spoilt for choice! While it is tricky to find a good quality adult Disney costume they do exist and you could always do a disneybound type casual costume if its easier.

Some of my favourite examples at the moment - Donald/Micky/Minnie, Belle, Snow White and other Princesses

Image from Disney Store UK

There are just too many to choose from!! Hopefully I've given you some inspiration - Happy Halloween!

Where the heck have I been?

No, seriously, its been 15 months and I have really missed keeping my blog but there have been so many changes in my life it was suddenly hard to keep up!

I moved across the country (again!), started a new job, worked my butt off, went through a total body transformation and had a baby. A year in life can make a big difference.
 

My little madam, although I feel it's unfair to call her that as she's pretty mellow actually, is now four months old and it's impossible to imagine life without her. I am currently on maternity leave and enjoying learning as much as I can about being a mum. So far this time has been a mixture of joy, frustration, moments of nothing much and ones of complete excitement, but I realised that I wasn't doing a very good job at keeping a record of the things I'd been doing, something this blog was originally started for.

I can't believe it has taken 4 months of time off with my daughter before it became clear to me that I needed to restore my creative outlet.

I've still been my usual self while I wasn't updating, dressing in my special way, eating lots of food, sewing and faffing about with my hair, although I must admit my costuming has been limited by the baby bump. I might do a throwback post from time to time to try and ensure that the time is not lost but I don't think I'll be doing very many of those.

So I'm back, I'll still be posting the usual but with some added baby nonsense every now and again (note the new button in the side bar).

I also might occasionally write about my efforts to shift this baby weight. I have a whole rail of clothing I can't wear at the moment so I'll post with joy as I am able to get back into things - or occasionally into things for the first time! Regaining my self-esteem is going to a big challenge and part of the reason I hadn't posted very much is that I was feeling pretty low about myself. But lets be positive - this body made a life - I need to take care of it and start loving it a little more.

I want to start by sharing one of my favourite dresses that I wore during my pregnancy.

Around 28 weeks

At 38 weeks

I acquired this dress from a lady in a Vivien of Holloway group and she sold it to me second hand. It was a size bigger than my usual so it could accommodate the bump.

It is a Runaround Sue dress in a black strawberry print. It was out some time ago and was something that I missed out on so I was really glad to pick up one second hand as I've wanted this design for some time. That is one thing I love about Vivien of Holloway the buy, share, swap element of dress collecting is great fun. 
 

To give you an idea about the changes in my body I am still wearing this dress now and thank goodness it's so comfortable and flattering that even with 15 extra lbs.

Aaaaaand finally here is me and my little munchkin. I won't be posting many pictures of her because this is my blog after all, not hers, but she is such a big part of my life now I felt I had to share at least one.

 See you again for more adventures soon!

It's a nice day, to go to a wedding in a Vivien of Holloway Kitty dress

‘Tis the season for weddings! Yey! Who doesn’t love a wedding? I adore getting dressed up for events and an excuse to buy a nice new dress is always appreciated.

This was the first wedding I have been to since my own wedding so it was really fun to see it all from the other side of things.

As it was a summer wedding I decided to go with something light and floral and luckily for me Vivien of Holloway had just put a new Kitty dress on their site in peach and royal blue florals.

I have ranted and raved about the Kitty dress so many times I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you how wonderful it is again. But if you had any doubt, it is amazing. It is still my favourite design of their dresses by a very long way. It's just soooo flattering!

Because of the dress’s blue tones I wore the dress with a blue light cardigan and a pair of blue highwoods from Lotta from Stockholm. I felt they were the perfect summer accessories.

I made a particular effort when pin curling my hair I let them dry and set for even longer than usual and gave them a very thorough brushout. I was really very pleased with the result, it ended up being far smoother and sleeker than usual. I only wish I knew what I did differently this time that lead to the lovely smooth curls. But sometimes you just need a bit of luck with hair.

Outfit Details

Dress: Vivien of Holloway

Cardigan: Monsoon

Shoes: Lotta from Stockholm

Belt: Vintage

What is your dream wedding guest outfit?

Vintage Event: Riding the old trains at the Bluebell railway 1940s weekend

A little while ago I went to the Bluebell Railway for their Southern at War weekend. It was a whole weekend of memorials and activities dedicated to preserving the memory of WWII.

The Bluebell railway is a preserved heritage railway and it has many working steam trains there for visitors to ride and authentically kept stations, platforms and surroundings. This meant that the whole place was the perfect location for a weekend of vintage style frolicks.

I decided to get dressed up for the event and wore a true vintage 1940s green dress and a (late) 1940s suit jacket over the top. I got a few compliments on my look and I was quite pleased with how it turned out.

 

 The husband and I got train tickets so that we could explore the other stations and ride on the train. I'm so glad we did as the 20 minute train journey in the vintage carriage was lovely, there were so many bluebells along the line too it was clear to see where the line got its name from.

Here is one of the lovely steam trains:

And me by one of the carriages:

There were also other period vehicals on display too from vintage army vans and trucks to fire engines.

Best name for a car ever!

Something that I really liked was the fact that they had renactors around who were playing the role of the home guard, as well as singers, dancers and stalls selling vintage wares. All of these things added to the authentic feel of the weekend and I loved it. I also really liked how many visitors had decided to get dressed up too, there were moments when you would look down the train platform and see only people dressed in 1940s clothing and it really made you feel like you had stepped back in time.

 

There was also a flypast by a Hurricane which did a pretty amazing job.

 The railway platforms were great places to be a bit silly to take pictures, there were lots of props. I especially liked the huge pile of luggage!

Outfit Details:

Dress: Vintage

Jacket: Vintage

Gloves: Vintage

Bag: Vintage

Hat: Vintage

Shoes: Rocket Originals

Yeah, I went pretty hardcore on the outfit this time around.

Have you ever been to a reenactment event?

Jennie on Jenny: My New Favourite Skirt from PinUP Girl Couture #JennyJuly

I have always lived the look of a big full skirt and a fitted top, whether that comes in the form of a Dior New Look dress or in the form of a full skirt and t shirt. So it was only natural that I fell in love with the Jenny skirt. Even without seeing one in real life I knew they would be amazing. They come in a vast array of novelty prints and colours with huge gathered skirts that really emphasise the waist to hip ratio.

 

In the last 6^th months or so I have been so obsessed with PUG. No, not little doggies, but Pinup Girl clothing. In particular their Jenny skirt. The skirts are not cheap, retailing at around $100 but after a lot of scrimping and saving I managed to scrape together enough money to try a Jenny skirt from the Magic of Mary Blair Collection.

The design I went for was the commuter skirt which was in a gorgeous olive green with a 60s novelty border print featuring train commuters in shades of black and white. I almost felt like this skirt was designed for me ESPECIALLY given the name ;)

I bought the skirt form UK PUG stockists Deadly is the female who were great, super quick delivery and really well packaged.

Once it arrived I decided to wear it for a picnic with my husband in the park. Much fun and frolicking was had, and I spend a ridiculously large amount of time twirling around and lounging in the grass.

 

Pretending to be a statue... as you do.

Now, shall we discuss the skirt itself?

I LOVE IT LOVE IT LOVE IT!!! It is the best skirt ever. I feel really special when I wear it - which utterly amazing given how down I have felt about my figure lately.

It swishes when you walk and it really makes me feel like a 50s siren.

It is really full and made with a very thick brushed cotton, it feels very sumptuous and has an almost shiny, luxurious feeling to it. There is also sooooo much of it, like, yards and yards - totally justifies the price.

Now a lot is made about the sizes of these skirts and the fact that they are small fitting. I ordered and XL and when I measures the waist it was 32 inches. This is what I would expect for a UK 14 so the sizing seemed about right to me.

The thing that I really especially love about this skirt how well it swishes and twirls, I imagine it would be great for dancing too! In fact, here I am mid-twirl, looking like I am about to take off. Lulz...

I have decided that I love this skirt so much that I have even ordered another Jenny in the Italian landscape print. I look forward to showing you that skirt too!

Outfit Details:

Skirt: Pinup Girl

Top: Primark

Shoes: Rocket Originals

Bag: Vintage

Several other bloggers I follow are also obsessed with Jenny skirts like Miss Amy May and Atomic Amber of the British Belles. In fact Miss Amy has even started #JennyJuly so that other Jenny obsessives can showcase their pretties. Check them out if you want to see more of Jenny.

A Pinup-Style Stars and Stripes Outfit for the 4th of July

Ah, who doesn’t love a good holiday?! Especially one that you can dress up for. Now I may not be from the USA and maybe it is a weird conflict of interest if a Brit dresses up for 4^th of July but what the heck. I did it anyway.

 

Back in November I made a skirt for my appearance on a panel about women in comic book movies. I dressed as a retro version of Wonder Woman with a blue circle skirt printed with white stars.

It was only during the depths of winter that I accidentally got the skirt out of my wardrobe while wearing a red stripe t shirt. I actually took until I looked at the skirt and the top in the mirror that I realised how much it looked like the ol’ stars and stripes of the USA.

I decided to save the outfit for the 4^th of July for obvious reasons.

So here is my USA themed outfit:

It was rather a lot of fun to wear and I can’t help but feel that I will end up wearing it again.

Outfit Details:

Skirt: Home made

Belt: Charity shop

Top: Primark

Shoes: Lotta from Stockholm

What do you think? Have you ever dressed up as a flag? It seems like a good Eurovision party idea…

Thrifty Vintage: A summer dirndl skirt and a retro jumper

Wow its warm isn't it! I can't decide whether I love the warm whether because it is a chance for me to experiment with new outfits, or whether I hate it because EVERYTHING is too warm.

One day when it wasn't soooooo hot I decided to wear a new to me dirndl skirt in a cotton gingham check. It has a gorgeous gathered skirt that manages to be full, but also quite flattering. I also love the black lace trim at the bottom of the skirt as it add a bit more to the look of the skirt (I am a bit obsessed with border print skirts and that type of thing so I have been on the look out for anything with a border feature).

The best part though is that it only cost £9 from eBay!

 Also on a side note words cannot describe how pleased I was with my hair in these photos!

I have also discovered a new brand of shoes, I am sure lots of you vintage lovers will know of Rocket Originals, but if you haven't you should check them out. Their shoes are not cheap (between £60-80) but they are made in the UK from old vintage designs. I want all of the pairs in EVERY colour.

Outfit details:

Skirt: Vintage

Shoes: Rocket Originals

Top: Wallis

Necklace: Vintage