Yes You Can Costumes

Making the Extraordinary from the Ordinary

Marzipan Reed Flutes – Costume Pieces

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How do you turn a pile of clothes on a bed into costumes with scrumptious colors, layers and textures?

Our master bed is often my visual “storyboard” for potential outfit layouts.

To start this story, we’re going to have to travel back *gulp* thirteen years, to my senior year of college. I took a textiles class to fulfill the art credit I needed to graduate. I was drawn to the textiles course because…obviously. Also, I had a hankering to try my hand at weaving ever since I inherited some linen woven by my great-great-great Grandmother, Kajsa (Kye-suh) Sjöquist. I believe it was even made from flax grown on the family farm in Småland, Sweden.

Kajsa and Karl, and her beautiful weaving, lace, and drawn-thread embroidery. My Great Aunt Kay got to visit their home in Blomstermåla and church in Kråksmåla.

Setting up the loom was intense! My professor had a huge hand in helping me. If I messed up the placement of even one, vertical warp thread, the finished piece would have a flaw in its pattern through its entire length. *Yikes!* Speaking of patterns, I selected designs for all of my projects from the Manual of Swedish Handweaving. It was a library book that I had pored over as a teen. (Nerd alert!) I remembered it and asked my mom to check it out and mail it to me from Washington to Oklahoma. Yes, this is quite the saga!

Me at the loom: Featuring my stress acne and early attempts at taking selfies.

Of course, the actual scarf I used as part of Emma’s Marzipan Elf costume is the only piece I didn’t take photos of while it was on the loom. *Sigh* It was the third and final project I had to complete for the class. I made it from scraps of leftover yarn in my professor’s stash, and scrambled to finish it in time before graduating!

The scarf was barely long enough to wear, so I left the fringe longer on one side to extend its length as much as possible.

Moving along! Most of Emma’s costume pieces were either from her or my closets. Here are a few of the thrifted items.

*Pro Tip* Always snap up cool boots and thermal underlayers at the thrift store. They rarely turn up on the cheap when you need them for something specific!

And…Here are all of Emma’s costume pieces! Her hat (as well as most of the others) were hand-me-downs from friends. I know how to knit and crochet, but haven’t in years. I look forward to dusting off those skills when teaching our kids!

So, you’re probably sick of hearing about scarves, by now. I still hope you will indulge me one more time: The scarf on the right was made for me by my dear college roommate. I still wear it to this day. The scarf is so soft and I love the color! This scarf became the shoulder sash of Elliott’s costume.

The brown, velvet blazer was also part of my college wardrobe, and the green shirt is mine, as well! Everything else was hand-me-downs, or thrifted. Here are all of Elliott’s costume pieces.

Eliza’s purple cardigan began as a sad, stained sweater that I dyed for her Pilgrim costume, a few years ago.

I love the green, embroidered blouse that was layered under Eliza’s hand-me-down sundress. Too bad it’s not my size!

In case you didn’t already know; red is Eliza’s favorite color. So, naturally, she wore the red hat!

Oliver kept toasty warm in a thrifted thermal top and vintage, wool sweater. (I made sure he wore a turtleneck in between so he wouldn’t feel itchy!)

So many of our friends have generously given us their kids’ outgrown clothes, over the years. They know that I use all sorts of things to make costumes . . . And I do! Oliver got to wear two, cute, hand-me-down pieces: The hat and the shoulder scarf! His boots were from Zulily.

Most of Annika’s costume pieces came from the YWCA Thrift Store. How cute is the corduroy, double-breasted jacket and the ribbon-laced boots?

The rest of Annika’s costume pieces were her own clothes.

AND . . . If you don’t believe me . . . Here is our family’s 2020 Christmas Card! Can you see how many articles of clothing they also wore as Marzipan Elves? I can count three, not including their boots, which were cropped out of these photos.

However, you can sure see the footwear in these shots that didn’t quite make the Christmas card . . .

Oh, Annika. She used to flip out whenever a camera was around. These days, she practices her nonconformity through another medium: Clowning.

Future album cover/Annika descending Mt. Sinai

And, there you have it! Thank you for going on a time travel adventure with me. Maybe it’s overkill to share how deep the origins of my inspiration go. However, if you’re still reading, I hope that means that you understand.

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Marzipan Behind the Scenes Bloopers – Homemade Nutcracker

Hello, friends! I’m going to try to take pretty pictures and still keep things real on this blog. So, in that spirit, I am going to give you the scoop: Taking group shots of these little rascals is HARD.

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Annika, stop chewing the scenery.

So hard, in fact that I considered scrapping this photo shoot midway through. However, I would have missed out on some beautiful moments . . . And the gift of these bloopers that will make us laugh for years to come!

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Elliott wasn’t feeling it at the start of the photo shoot.

I like the side-eye Eliza is giving me in the first image, and Annika’s fierce, cookie-biting face in the second.

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I wanted the kids to be lined up from youngest to oldest, but Annika had other ideas . . . Then, I had to tell the older ones to just let her in wherever. They were trying to be good and tell Annika where she was *supposed* to go, but that was only causing a new kerfuffle.

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Easily the most exhausting part of photographing a group of young ones is to convince all of them to be as flexible as *you*, the photographer, have to be!

Oliver knows how to smile ’til it hurts…

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At this point, I was thinking, “Perhaps it really is unreasonable to expect everyone to look simultaneously thrilled to be here”.

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Eliza saw me editing this next series of photos and laughed so hard that she “let loose” . . . If you know what I mean. Right next to me. At the computer desk.

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You’ve been warned: Laugh responsibly.

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Eliza is like, “BEEBS. Staaahhhp!!!”

. . . Annika doesn’t look at all mischievous, here . . .

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. . . Oliver was over it, and Eliza must have decided, “If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em!”

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Eliza was disgruntled when I asked her to only use the recorder as a prop, as God intended.

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I mean, let’s be real: A recorder does not usually render beautiful music when in the hands of a small child.

However, I’ll give Eliza the last word in this homage to her amazing, recorder-inspired facial expressions.

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I allowed Eliza some free rein, then ask her to do a few “normal” faces. This is when she sternly told me “Next time, I get to pick how to be in the pictures”.

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The photo on the right is Eliza setting me straight on who is really in charge of this operation.

. . . Aaannnddd, last but not least, this is what is really happening behind the scenes: Jeff is there with his steady patience and amazing child-wrangling skills. He is the master of coaxing unwilling smiles and keeping everyone upbeat. (Including me!)

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Speaking of Jeff, I may be the one making the costumes, but his calm support makes all of this possible. His presence turned something stressful into something enjoyable. And, you know what? I got lovely shots, after all.

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