A quiet Halloween hiking with my little pumpkin in Northumberland

Halloween had always been a big deal for me. I've always gone somewhere or done something, whether that be a visit to a comic convention or a night out or a gathering at a friends. But I'm living a quieter life at the moment with the (not so) new baby so this year was a quieter affair.

My parents had booked a holiday cottage for Halloween in Craster, a tiny village on the Northumberland coast. From the cottage you could see Dunstanburgh castle on the hill nearby and there was a lovely cool calm about the place - so relaxing!

We went out for several walks along the coast. When it comes to walking and hiking I'm a bit of a weirdo. Most people wear special trousers and fleeces etc. but I've always been adamant that I can wear a dress. I still have a waterproof coat and a good study pair of boots but if I can't wear a dress, it's not worth doing ;)

Once of my current staples is the Audrey dress by Lindy Bop. The Audrey is one of their more iconic designs and the two I currently wear are made from a I'm thick cotton broadcloth with autumnal florals, one in blue, one in black. What is even better I got them in the crazy summer sale this year so they were only £9 each (they are still on sale in a few small sizes). They have definitely paid for themselves 10 times over as I wear them both all the time! I am also wearing them with a Lindy Bop cardigan which is doing okay, but not fairing half as well at the dresses.

We took the little madam for a walk in her ergobaby carrier which is somehow still comfy after several miles even with a 18lb baby like mine. She was so interested in everything around it was fascinating to watch her watching everything else.

We repeated the walk a few days later and I had the push chair, an interesting experience I'll say, and that is when my mum took that amazing silhouette photograph heading this post. The Sun was just getting low in the sky and the light was so perfect.

This is the most relaxed I've ever spent a Halloween but I must say I rather enjoyed it.

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!

Lates at Life and a costume inspired by Magenta from Rocky Horror

Howdy everyone!

Waaaaay back around Halloween (where did November go?!) I went to a Late event at the Centre for Life in Newcastle. I used to work there and worked a couple of the late events back in the day so I know how much fun they can be and I really wanted to see the exhibition they have going on right now so it was a double bonus of awesome.

Because it was Halloween it was also a dress up event and as I was travelling light visiting home I decided to work on a variation of my Wednesday Addams dress that I featured in this post.

I changed it up by adding a retro style apron to make it into a sort of retro-chic version of Magenta from Rocky Horror (although Rocky Horror is pretty retro...). I used face paint for paleness and I curled my hair, although it was a bit damp so the fullness fell out pretty quickly :(

 We had a good opportunity to look around some of the exhibits (which had changed since I worked there) and we did get to look at the Body Worlds exhibit which was absolutely amazing! Although we were not allowed to take any pictures so sadly I can't share any images. Mind you the Bodyworlds exhibition has been extended so if you're in the North East it is well worth a look.

Being a Biologist I love getting my hand on a microscope.

And my favourite exhibit that I can share was this giant book showing the DNA sequence of the X chromosome. The idea is that each of those giant books is one piece of human DNA and you have all the books in every cell in you body. It really helps you to see how much information is carried in our bodies!

I also got my hands on a chalk board before the place got busy... heh heh... and since I've been obsessing over Sailor Moon Crystal I had to draw Sailor Moon. Not that she's very spooky.

 We also saw a planetarium show, which I can't show you either, but after that we finished there we got to prance around in a smoke machine while listening to some choice tunes.

Oh and here are a few extra shots of the outfit:

Dress: Vintage

Apron: Home made

Boots: Clarks (borrowed from my mother)

Cosplay Tips: Last Minute Couples Halloween Costumes

My husband and I had a great time cosplaying together at MCM London Comic Con last weekend so I thought I would put together a bit of an ideas post for you, featuring some of my favourite couples cosplays and costumes!

My husband and I dressed as Luigi and Princess Daisy from the Super Mario franchise:

Mostly the costumes are of an 'everyday cosplay' nature since it is only a few days to Halloween. On a side note, I also want to add that 'couples' in this instance means a couple of people, or a pair, I don't mean you have to be a couple, you could be friends, brothers, whatever. I don't really want you to limit costume ideas to your gender either - Rule 63 'For every given male character, there is a female version of that character. For every given female character, there is a male version of that character' can be a great idea to play with when doing fancy dress.

1 - DA

No, not the district attorney. Dumbledore's Army. Well, pretty much anyone from Happy Potter in general. Getting hold of s v-neck jumper and tie is pretty easy, generally you can borrow from a brother or father and getting something in the right house colours is pretty straightforward too. With an array of characters with various hair styles and colours too you can probably find someone to suit your needs. You could be Harry and Hermione, Hermione and Ron, Ron and Harry, Hermione and Luna or my personal favourite Luna and Neville. Just add a stick for a wand and your done.

2 - Bonnie and Clyde

A vintage inspired gangster number next, finding a lovely pencil skirt, or pinstripe suit is a good way to start this costume off. Add some plastic pistols and a fedora and you're done. Simple but effective!

3 - Angel and Devil

This one is another simple one that is pretty much gender neutral too. One person is an angel, one is a devil. One dresses all in white, one all in red. If you have time you can add angel wings or a set of horns wings - these are available in good fancy dress shops, but constructing some out of cardboard and string or and alice band should be fairly east too.

Optional extra: a large person that you can sit on the shoulders of...

(Kidding...)

4 - Superman and Lois Lane

This one requires a little forethought, in that someone needs to visit a costume shop, but lets face it even Argos has a superman costume (although I'm not sure how good it is). But the rest of the costume is really easy, pencil skirt, blouse, note pad and you could print off a Daily Planet press pass if you're feeling creative. To quote Gordon Ramsay - done!

5 - Mulder and Scully

A wonderful 1990s classic here, Mulder and Scully from the X-files are a great option for a couple costume. All you need is a 90s power suit, toy gun and some faux FBI passes. Heck, you could even chuck in a little plushie 'little green man' if you're feeling a little bit eccentric.

6 - Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy

This last one requires a bit more effort, but is a bonus suggestion that makes the list because it is one I've actually done. I was going to a fancy dress event with Miss Doherty of The Vanity Case and the theme was superheroes. We decided to dress as comic book BFFs Harley and Ivy. The Harley costume is available to buy on some websites and costume shops, and a Poison Ivy costume could be whipped up quite quickly if you were to simplify the leotard using only a few leaves.

These are of course just a few ideas. Do you have any better ones? Let me know, I always like more suggestions!

Cosplay Costume: A Ghastly Marie Curie Costume for Halloween

This year Halloween fell on a Wednesday and like many other people I spent the day, and the night, at work. This certainly was no bad thing, well aside from the exhaustion of working until almost 2am (!),  but other than that it was an absolute blast!

Image by Elin Roberts

Since I work in a science centre I had the option to spend the day dressed up. This was an opportunity I took to with gusto - I published earlier about some of my favourite science themed costumes and decided to go with one of these for my costume.

I chose to mix a little vintage, a little spooky and a lot of bad taste and dress as a deceased Marie Curie.  Marie Curie is one of the most well known scientists of all time, in fact, a survey by Science Grrl confirmed that 61% of people knew Curie over all other female scientists. She is most famous for her ground breaking work on radioactivity.

A lot of her work was carried out in the 1890s-1910s (she was awarded a Nobel prize in 1903 AND 1911!) and as such I spent a lot of time hunting down the perfect Victorian/Edwardian black dress with puff sleeves and a good length skirt. The dress ended up being vintage Laura Ashley and unfortunately had short sleeves, so I added a long sleeve top underneath to give it a more Edwardian feel.

My hair was done with a headpiece from that looked like a large knotted hair bun. I liked this immensely but I felt it was a shame I hadn't manage to get hold of some coloured hair spray to cover my blonde but never mind. Sometimes things end up a little rushed.
Finally my 'turn of the century' style boots completed the look.

I don't often do scary make up so this is still a grey area for me. I didn't want to be a zombie so I was stuck somewhere between ghost and ghoul (whatever the difference is there?). I used some white face paint to create a white base and some eyeshadow to create the hollow eyes and cheeks. I used the black lipstick l bought to be a flapper to complete the look. I did try to use the paint around my neck but the lanyard made it difficult to get coverage.

Since I couldn't use anything radioactive in my costume, thank goodness, I mimicked the glowing radiation effect using glow sticks. I felt that during the evening these could have been better placed, but never mind, I then added a beauty queen sash displaying the radioactivity hazmat symbol just to secure the joke although I'm not sure this was in the best taste... but I'll leave that up to you.

Madame Curie in the lab, of course...

Finally I added some ghostly cobwebs.

All photos are taken at least 6 hours after applying the make up so I have to say I think it lasted pretty well. Luckily I did have time to give it a top up on the night for the Late Event.

View from the Foley Studio - Image by Elin Roberts

During the late event I was manning the Foley Studio where guests were able to record their own soundtrack to clips from classic hammer horror flicks. It was really great fun but it meant I didn't get to see a lot of the other events - luckily for me Life's head of public engagement, and regular event photographer, Elin Roberts was on hand to capture the spooky science (you can see more photos here)!

Costumes, Cocktails and Glowing Brains - Image by Elin Roberts

Zombies! Image by Elin Roberts

Skull Carnival Games - Image by Elin Roberts

So Many Costumes! - Image by Elin Roberts

Next door to the Foley Studio was the Peppers Ghost photo booth. This was based on a classic theatre illusion that makes it appear as if a ghost is in the room with you. Luckily for me - I got to try this out before any of the guests arrived!

Me as a human and Emma as a ghost - Images from Science at Life Flickr

Now I'm the ghost and Emma is the person - Images from Science at Life Flickr

All in all I had a really fun night and laughed my way through the Foley studio but after nearly 14 hours on my feet I virtually needed to crawl home!

How was your Halloween? Did anyone do anything fun?

Cosplay Costume: Sookie Stackhouse from True Blood

This weekend began the Halloween celebrations began. Being a fancy dress fan Halloween comes as an opportunity for me to share my love of costumes with those close to me.

My friend Philippa was having a Halloween house party, several of my friends from work were going and Philippa was nice enough to let me bring my husband along too.

I have wanted to dress a Sookie Stack house for some time now but haven't, partly because there hasn't been an appropriate event, but also because I was a bit to large to fit into my denim shorts...

Luckily for me the party was at the perfect time and taking up running meant that those shorts were a good fit again.

The key to Sookie's look is the blonde hair, pale pink lip, a summer dress or her Merlotte's bar work uniform. I decided to go for the more iconic outfit and invested in a t-shirt and apron that were branded Merlotte's Bar and Grill. These came as a set from eBay and I was pretty pleased with them, being very picky I'd say the logo on the top was a little too big but all in all it worked out really well.

Here's Sookie's look:

My friend Sam asked me whether I was going to try and replicate Anna Paquin's trademark gap tooth look which I'll admit I had completely forgotten about until then. But after some careful online research I became aware of 'tooth wax'. It cost me £1.49 for a huge pot so hopefully it won't dry out in case I need to wear it again.

Overall it was a very comfortable way to spend an evening, even the wig lasted well which was a big surprise to me as it was snowed on earlier in the evening.

Mr Fancy dressed as Bill Compton (yey couples costume!) but that pretty much involved him wearing his work clothes and some pale face paint... Mostly because I forgot to pick up some fangs for him :(

The party guests totally excelled themselves! We had a zombie Mona Lisa, Mario and Luigi  an ewok, Princess Diana and so many more! It was really excellent work by all who attended.

Cosplay Tips: The Best Science Themed Costumes for Halloween

Halloween is approaching very quickly now with just one week to go before the big night - plenty of time to put something a little bit special together.

Some of you may know that outside the blog, vintage and costume world that I am a scientist - so I thought I'd make a list of some science themed Halloween of varying difficulty for you to get your teeth into. After all Halloween is the one night of the year when adults, as well as children, are able to dress outrageously, so why not embrace it?

I am planning on wearing one of these costumes to work for our Halloween Late event and I'm pretty excited!

Here is my pick of some of the best science themed Halloween costumes:

Dr. Frankenstein, Frankenstein’s Monster or Bride of Frankenstein

From Frankenstein 1931 here and Bride of Frankenstein 1935 here

Good ol' Frank is the original mad scientist! You could play the part of scientist with nuts and bolts and a sawn off (false) leg. Another option is that you could dress are Dr Frankenstein’s monster made up of the composite parts of previously deceased individuals - a flat top head mask and neck bolts from a fancy dress shop are an option but for a simpler, and quicker, version you could paint sewing seams and ghoulish make-up to your flesh. For ladies wanting an alternative spin on this classic you could take the Bride of Frankenstein route by digging out a gaudy old wedding dress, pale make-up and big hair with spray streaks in either side.

Darwin, Einstein or Curie

Darwin, Curie & Einstein

The beauty of these costumes is that they are mostly able to be made using bits and pieces from your wardrobe or charity shop, an old dress, a vintage suit, with the addition of a few fancy dress items. The above are just a few of the many options you have if you want to attempt the famous scientist route. For example for Darwin you need a long grey beard (and perhaps, for Einstein a voluminous white wig and for Marie Curie a black dress, Edwardian up-do and if you're feeling in a bit of bad taste some glow sticks?

Schrodinger’s Cat

Image source

Everyone knows of the traditional Halloween black cat costume and Schrodingers cat is a science twist on this traditional costume. Schrodinger’s cat was a thought experiment that ponders whether a cat in a box is alive or dead (more info can be found here). To give the, widely available, cat costume the quantum mechanics spin you could add cardboard speech bubbles saying 'am I alive?' and 'am I dead?' you could even pick up a box to wear from your local supermarket. If you're feeling very adventurous you could even make up one side of your costume to look like a zombie cat.

Sci-fi Inspiration

Weird Science, 'Doc' Emmet Brown, Mr Spock 

Taking inspiration from science fiction films is another option, a ‘mad’ scientist like Doc Brown from Back to the Future or Lisa, synthesised girl from the movie Weird Science! At a push I'd also add Mr Spock from Star Trek - he was the science officer after all.

Cardboard Robots

I know this one's not cardboard, but you get the idea right?

If you've looked at some of my other costume posts you'll know this is one of my personal favourites - the cardboard creation! Suiting up in boxes to appear as a robot is pretty nifty and all it takes is a lick of paint and some creative scissor work. If you're stuck for inspiration check out the amazing box work of transformers fans - some of their designs even transform! Another extrapolation of this idea is the painted A-board style costume - two bits of card, some poster paint and some shoulder straps and you can be almost anything you want! A cell? No problem, a Bunsen burner?  Sure, the Higgs boson? Perhaps a little trickier but with some creative cutting, why not.

I hope that's given you a few ideas if you're planning to take a turn for the geeky for whatever you are doing for Halloween.

Cosplay Review: Lions and Tigers and Tabby Cats, Oh my! - Kigurumi Suits and Animal Costumes

Hey there everyone! I'm finally back, and what a summer it's been. I have lots and lots of weird and wonderful things to share with you all, but don’t worry, I’ll be doing it a little at a time.

Anywho, I have something a little but silly to get started with.

Last year I wrote about the MCM Expo in London and this event is huge, not only for cosplayers, but also for costume and fancy dress novices alike.

One type of simple and fun costume that I keep seeing more and more off at these types of events, and occasionally on the high street is the kigurumi suit.

The kigurumi suit, affectionately referred to by my friend Ms.Doherty as a ‘giant baby-grow’ and often also referred to as a ‘onesie’, has grown in popularity and seems to be worn by vast numbers of people attending festivals, going on stag or occasionally hen dos or even for lounging about in the house.

In fact back at Christmas last year, I saw a Superman suit hanging next to a Santa suit in the high street ‘mecca’ that is Primark!

Well, I had to know what the fuss was about… and lets face it, when writing a thesis, what could possibly be more useful than a fleecy one-piece suit to wear while snuggled up writing in the house?

Yes, I know, I have shattered all of your glamorous illusions now haven’t I?

So, where to buy my suit? Well, I managed to find a website called Animal Costume Shop – a site with so many kigurumi suits shaped like so many animals my mind was a little bit boggled.

After much deliberation I decided to go with the grey tabby cat, mostly because it looked quite a bit like my very own tabby cat - impeccable logic.

When it arrived it was wrapped up in a little packet, its little eyes and ears looking out of the wrapper.

The fabric is a sort of fleece, but its not too fluffy, so its warm but not too hot. The sizing was not the most flattering fit I have ever encountered, I am a person that is used to something fitted around the waist, so having something so baggy was a bit of an adjustment but I have to say, it was pretty comfortable!

My only problem with the fit was that the size L which was the main option available on the website was a little long in the body for me so I ended up with a sort of droop crotch kind of effect… and hopefully I will never have to use that phrase again!

If I am completely honest, I did feel a little silly while wearing it sometimes, and I was terrified I’d have to answer the door for someone to catch me wearing it. But for those wanting to wear it as a costume, I would definitely advise wearing something underneath as the white section could get a little see through in bright light.

I think they make great lounge suits, and are great for people looking for silly costumes for events, or even Halloween! There is also a range specifically for children that I would definitely recommend, I saw a kid in town dressed as a cow a few weeks ago it was adorable!

Oh and just for you guys, here’s a few more silly pictures!