Tribal Belly Dance Costume with Green Gold-Trimmed Choli, Red and Gold Hipscarf with Gold Coins and Full Black Gold-Trimmed Skirt

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So I started a belly dance class (beledi, to be precise) a few weeks back. Unsurprisingly, it’s always been something that appealed to me (fancy veils! shiny coins! etc.) but I’m ridiculously uncoordinated, disconnected from my body, overweight, quite self-conscious, can’t tell my right from my left, and in every way am the type of person who should stay well away from dance classes. But once I got over the abject terror involved in stepping into the studio and completing the first class, I was hooked. Hip shimmies are a lot of fun if you’ve got plenty of hip to put into them, for one thing, and the movements are something I can usually do once I watch closely and practice for a bit. Of course I’ll never be a “dancer” in any way; people say “just let go” and “just follow the music” and “don’t think about it” and apparently I walk around in a near constant state of tenseness because all that is impossible for me. In class I feel like I’m translating everything the teacher does into a flowchart for me to follow and when I do something with my body that I can’t explain with words, like pivoting or this one veil move, it’s really quite unsettling for me.

Anyways, as far as I know (and keep in mind I’m a total noob) there are two styles of costumes, cabaret and tribal, cabaret being the highly beaded bra and skirt look and tribal going for a more ethnic, fantasy look. I really like the tribal look, so that’s what I went with for this paper doll. She’s got a green choli, a red hipscarf and a black full skirt, all trimmed with gold and gold coins. I covet the choli I drew for my doll, but I’m not so sure I’d have the courage to wear it!

At the moment, the vampire has pulled ahead… there’s still time for the Good Queen to come back ahead though.

Mermaid Monday #6: Crimson Tailed Mermaid with White Ruffly Top and Ruby Jewelry

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This mermaid was born with red hair and a red tail, and although red has positive connotations in mermaid culture, associated with weddings as it is, she thought it was just too unfair for words to be naturally confined to one color and longed for shining black hair, or maybe a lovely gold tail instead. (Most mermaids have different color hair and tails, so we might consider her something of a mermaid albino, in a way.) She was quite self-conscious about it for some time, because she was teased about being destined to marry early by her mom and sisters and the less kind mermaids nicknamed her “Sockeye.” Then she figured out that humans found red an intriguing and sexy color, and they didn’t know that her peers thought that she was some kind of freak. So, far from being ashamed of her natural coloration, she embraced it and started spending more time on land than sea, dancing all night in outrageous crimson gowns and demanding presents of ruby jewelry from her admirers. She ended up forsaking the sea entirely and became a famous actress among humans, never marrying but constantly throwing spectacular parties in her indoor grotto for her favorite actors, artists, aristocrats and sometimes even a reformed pirate or two. Sometimes she would send invitations to those who had called her “Sockeye,” but the invitations were meant as a slap in the face and all concerned knew it.

Putting our scarlet girl aside for now, I am quite happy today because I ordered sixty-one new colored pencils this morning. Ten of them are colorless blenders, since those are like water running through my hands, soon sharpened into nothingness (well, actually into little stubs I can’t use until I find some decent pencil extender). Maybe 40% of them are replacements of colors that are getting low, and then the rest are colors that have come out in the ten years I’ve had my set. I’m ecstatic just thinking about their names! Pale sage! Ginger root! Kelp green! Come to me quickly, little pencils, and we will have some fun together.

This poll has a clear winner so far, but it’s not time for it to go away yet…

One Last Dress from My Fair Lady and Two Dresses from Titanic from Liana’s Paper Doll Boutique

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My apologies, my time management skills have been lacking the last couple of days! So, here are a couple of Boutique dresses instead, and I will draw something new tomorrow. I’m glad I worked on the Boutique so diligently all that time ago, it’ll be a while before I run out of things to post. Anyways, these are the green dress from My Fair Lady and the beaded gown and boarding dress from Titanic.

The other poll is still going to be open for a few days, but I also want to move on to the next batch…

Halloween Costume Series Day 20: Halloween Themed 1700s French Court Dress with Orange Bows and Spider Lace

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Now, I actually don’t believe in ghosts, but if Marie Antoinette walks the earth still, I like to think she has something like this to comfort her. It would certainly comfort me, not that I intend to become a ghost. Just think, if one was a ghost and wearing panniers one wouldn’t have to turn sideways to go through a door anymore! Thanks to Antoinette’s Closet for inspiration.

In any case, thank you everyone for following my costume month. My goal was to do one a day, and I got 20 done (plus one Hinawa, and a couple of Boutique posts) which isn’t bad. I hope those of you who aren’t really all that into Halloween didn’t get too bored, and I hope that those of you who do enjoy Halloween liked some of my costumes and are enjoying yourself in some fashion tonight.

So, now I want to know which one was everyone’s favorite. We’ll do this in four parts, with part 1 today and closing in two days…

Halloween Costume Series Day 15: Cute Ladybug Costume with Black Lace and Antennae

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So… yeah… has it really been four days? I’m so sorry, time flies when you’re glued to your computer playing Mother 3, which I think is possibly the best videogame I’ve ever played, ever. I can’t stop thinking about it and may start another play-through, but don’t worry, next time I’d balance it out with things like drawing paperdolls and doing dishes.

Anyways, back to Halloween! Sharon posted a comment about how her granddaughter’s name is Liana too and she loves ladybugs, so she wanted to see a ladybug costume — I hope this one doesn’t disappoint. Always happy to do something for a fellow Liana. When I was a kid I wanted to do something great and famous so that people would be inspired to name their daughters Liana and I could get pencils and stuff with my name printed on them. Since I never figured out what that great and famous thing would be, and “a pencil with my name on it” became less of a life goal in and of itself, I wound up drawing paperdolls, but nonetheless I urge people to consider the name Liana for their future children. It sounds pretty, it goes well with a variety of last names, it’s a type of tropical vine, a type of programming language and a kind of car, and — to me at least — it looks more simple and pure than Leanna, Lianna, Leeanne, and such variants. (Begone, double N!)

Hinawa’s Red and White Dress from Mother 3

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OK, I really can’t call this dress a costume, since it’s from a video game I’m very excited about, although it would make a good and easy, albeit verrrry obscure, Halloween costume. This is an outfit from the Game Boy Advance game Mother 3, worn by the main characters’ mother whose name is Hinawa. Mother is a series of Japanese RPGs, the second one of which is known in America as Earthbound. (The first one was fully localized, but never released in America.) Mother 2 (Earthbound) was a quirky, sometimes creepy, playful game which was extremely popular in Japan, but not so much in America. However, it became a cult classic and it attracted a huge, dedicated fanbase. They tried like crazy to get Nintendo’s attention, but even after sending Nintendo a petition to bring Mother 3 to America with more than 30,000 signatures, they were ignored. After Mother 3 came out two years ago and it was confirmed that there were no plans to bring Mother 3 out in English, they got together and made a translation themselves. It’s a fantastic game — if you liked Earthbound, please try Mother 3!

New poll soon…

Halloween Costume Series Day 12: Black and Purple Deadly Nightshade Evil Fairy Dress with Red Berry Jewelry

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So for some reason one of my most popular keywords these days is “printable paper dolls deadly night shade.” Hello out there, whoever it is who wants a nightshade paper doll! I hope you enjoy this one.

This fairy is a lackey for the Fairy of Malice, who you can see if you check out my old paper doll page and scroll a bit. And, I think, she also should make those of you who voted for skimpy costumes happy, and those of you who actually cut these paperdolls out sad, because I can’t imagine this being very easy to cut out!

Continue blasting back the zombies through the magic of paperdolls:

Halloween Costume Series Day 10: Queen Guinevere’s Gold-Edged Heavenly Blue Kirtle with Flowered Girdle and Crown

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I’ve got to log in for work — but I love you all so I’m posting this real quick with no story or complaining about how I don’t like the girdle. Thanks to rainbowjehan for help (way back when!) with Arthurian garments!

Last call for this poll…

Halloween Costume Series Day 9: Black Turtleneck Jumpsuit with Red Energy Dome from Devo’s Whip It video

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Here’s today’s entry, just mildly obscure (and thrown together quickly — there are days where, if the drawing and post take more than an hour combined, it just won’t happen, and today’s one of them). It’s the outfit the members of Devo wear in their video for Whip It, not forgetting, of course, the Energy Dome (and you can pretend there’s a little hard hat liner in there, too, if it pleases you). Brian’s favorite Devo song is Beautiful World but Whip It always puts me into a good mood when I’m feeling grumpy.

There’ll be a new poll soon, so vote in this one now!

Halloween Costume Series Day 8: Cleopatra White Linen Egyptian Dress with Blue Lotus Pattern, with Jeweled Collar and Red Sash

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I kind of broke my “no research all month” rule for this one, but it is not hard for me to find an excuse to look at ancient Egyptian clothes. This one is vaguely accurate, although I think the lotus pattern may be over the top, there’s no melting perfume cone and the clothes should be sheer anyways, for full royal style. That’s even further than today’s ’sexy Cleopatra’ revelers want to go… I used to want to be an Egyptologist, and I’ve even got a book or two on learning hieroglyphs in the other room. Then I discovered Japanese and kanji. No kidding.

If you’ve already taken my poll and answered “obscure costumes,” can you leave a comment and tell me what kinds of costumes you’re talking about? I’m very curious now, since that category’s done so well. I expected that sexy costumes would be low on the list for this crowd, but I wasn’t expecting that no one would choose ‘pop culture’ for a costume. What, no Jedis in this group? No Jokers? I thought everyone wanted to be the Joker this year…