88 Followers and Gogo Yubari
Good morning everyone!!
I checked my blog last night and saw that I had 88 followers, 88!!! So I thought I'd share this costume that I made last year for a Japanese themed night and had this whole chain of events in my head: 88 followers -> Crazy 88 -> Kill Bill -> Gogo Yubari -> Share costume. Now, on this lovely Saturday morning while the bf is still sleeping, I find that I have 90 followers, 90 followers!! I am so pleased :) Thank you all so much for following my little blog and the things I create :) It means a lot to me, especially as I feel that a lot of negativity is coming my way from people I know IRL so to see that there are still people that care and leave positive comments sure means a lot :)
Not wanting to deprive you of my Crazy 88 mind set, I still want to share the costume with you. The party was in January 2009 so a little while ago already, and it was Japanese themed. Obviously not very Japanese looking, I had a challenge. I love a good challenge! I went through so many ideas for a Japanese costume, thinking about manga characters like Lacus Cline, Rozen Maiden Mercury, and even Kiki from Kiki's Delivery Service. All this could be made with stuff I already partially had, but then no one would really know what they were since this was bound to be more of a piss up (I am in London after all) than a convention type event.
But THEN I had the best idea ever! And one that I thought was fairly easy to make. Gogo Yubari from Kill Bill. I was inspired after seeing the episode 'Go Go Gilmore' of the Gilmore Girls (a series I love and the last DVD had just arrived yay!) where Rory Gilmore dresses as Gogo Yubari. Enter £2 week at the charity shop as my blazer creating skills are far from good. I dont really have a how-to of this costume but let me decribe it first and wow you with the photographic evidence after :) I had to buy a food few things for this as a school outfit is not readily available in my closet. I didnt go to school here after all... So I bought a blazer for £2 (and a perfect fit and colour!) and bought some gold buttons as well to match the movie costume. I printed off a patch that I found on Google and stuck it on cardboard to have the right logo. Here is the link to another blog who actually has a great template too: Link to Patch.
Yes, someone else painted it, but it was only for one night so it was fine. I also bought some white sporty shoes (£2 at Primark), a white shirt (£1.50 at Primark), and white knee high socks (£1 at Primark). For those not from the UK, Primark is like Target but they only have clothing. And no, I dont own a white shirt, yugh... not really my style... Then I got some red ribbon as well for the necktie. Luckily I still had a skirt I could use at least ;) The wig was the worst, as all the wigs I checked were so ugly so a friend brought me a decent one. Not the cheapest but at least it looked ok.
No, no pics yet because the worst was yet to come... Gogo's Ball of Death or however you would like to call it... I googled reference pics all day and found a good replica here. When I found this, the image was actually linked to another site and said replica cost $150 which was not going to happen. Enter creativity.
I bought a styrofoam ball at the craft store and the same friend also bought some chain at the DIY store as he lived next door to one rather than me having to travel for like forever. Only a few weeks later did my colleagues tell me there was a DIY store really close to the office. Handy...
So anyway, as this was right around the time that London was going a bit crazy about knives in public (some crazy kids decided that stabbing people was fun), this ball had to look dangerous but had to be completely harmless to avoid any problems. I used craft foam to make the rim, and... wait for it... earplugs on toothpicks for the spikes!! I then cut the earplugs to shape and asked the bf to spraypaint the whole thing silver. Little did I know not to use normal spray paint on styrofoam as the whole thing started melting... He didnt know either so I guess am not that blonde ;) NOW I know this though hihi... So the Ball of Death had a few dimples... Nothing major though. One silver spiky ball achieved.
Close but no cigar. I still had to add the chains... Luckily my friend brought me a range of chains to chose from so I went off and checked what I could use for this. I chose the smallest chain tp glue around the ball:
Looking pretty good already huh? Really, I cant tell you how proud I was of this...
The hole where I stuck the ball on a very large toothpick (one of those shashlik ones) came in handy when having to attach the large chain. I painted the top of a milk bottle silver, cut a slit in it, screwed a hook into the ball where the hole was, and glued the bottle cap on top with the hook sticking through the lid. Sounds confusing? I mean this:
Because, looking back at the reference, this is what it looks like. -Ish anyway LOL. Oh yes, I also need to add the chain... so I looked a keyring through the hook and attached a large plastic (also health and safety approved) to the it as well. The chain was a white one that I had to spray paint silver also. It was a little larger than in the reference but it still looked good. This is the final result of Gogo's Ball of Death:
The handle was a toilet roll covered in tape with yet another keyring. Not bad huh?? And it worked too!
Here I am on the night itself happily swinging my Ball of Death. Yes, I look way too happy about that LOL
This was my best reference and comparison. Ignore my posing, I really must practice... But with a few items from the charity shop and some craftiness, I managed to get the look quite well :) And at least everyone recognised the character and I had no problems getting in with my very dangerous looking but really kitty-safe Ball of Death :)
I hope you enjoyed reading about this as much as I did making it :) I know Halloween is over, but my costuming never stops ;) You'll see as it will be SantaCon in a mere three weeks, wait until you see my costume for that!!
For all my new followers, thank you so much and dont forget to enter my giveaway! You have until midnight tonight UK time. I'm off to get some brekkie now, enjoy your Saturday!
I checked my blog last night and saw that I had 88 followers, 88!!! So I thought I'd share this costume that I made last year for a Japanese themed night and had this whole chain of events in my head: 88 followers -> Crazy 88 -> Kill Bill -> Gogo Yubari -> Share costume. Now, on this lovely Saturday morning while the bf is still sleeping, I find that I have 90 followers, 90 followers!! I am so pleased :) Thank you all so much for following my little blog and the things I create :) It means a lot to me, especially as I feel that a lot of negativity is coming my way from people I know IRL so to see that there are still people that care and leave positive comments sure means a lot :)
Not wanting to deprive you of my Crazy 88 mind set, I still want to share the costume with you. The party was in January 2009 so a little while ago already, and it was Japanese themed. Obviously not very Japanese looking, I had a challenge. I love a good challenge! I went through so many ideas for a Japanese costume, thinking about manga characters like Lacus Cline, Rozen Maiden Mercury, and even Kiki from Kiki's Delivery Service. All this could be made with stuff I already partially had, but then no one would really know what they were since this was bound to be more of a piss up (I am in London after all) than a convention type event.
But THEN I had the best idea ever! And one that I thought was fairly easy to make. Gogo Yubari from Kill Bill. I was inspired after seeing the episode 'Go Go Gilmore' of the Gilmore Girls (a series I love and the last DVD had just arrived yay!) where Rory Gilmore dresses as Gogo Yubari. Enter £2 week at the charity shop as my blazer creating skills are far from good. I dont really have a how-to of this costume but let me decribe it first and wow you with the photographic evidence after :) I had to buy a food few things for this as a school outfit is not readily available in my closet. I didnt go to school here after all... So I bought a blazer for £2 (and a perfect fit and colour!) and bought some gold buttons as well to match the movie costume. I printed off a patch that I found on Google and stuck it on cardboard to have the right logo. Here is the link to another blog who actually has a great template too: Link to Patch.
Yes, someone else painted it, but it was only for one night so it was fine. I also bought some white sporty shoes (£2 at Primark), a white shirt (£1.50 at Primark), and white knee high socks (£1 at Primark). For those not from the UK, Primark is like Target but they only have clothing. And no, I dont own a white shirt, yugh... not really my style... Then I got some red ribbon as well for the necktie. Luckily I still had a skirt I could use at least ;) The wig was the worst, as all the wigs I checked were so ugly so a friend brought me a decent one. Not the cheapest but at least it looked ok.
No, no pics yet because the worst was yet to come... Gogo's Ball of Death or however you would like to call it... I googled reference pics all day and found a good replica here. When I found this, the image was actually linked to another site and said replica cost $150 which was not going to happen. Enter creativity.
I bought a styrofoam ball at the craft store and the same friend also bought some chain at the DIY store as he lived next door to one rather than me having to travel for like forever. Only a few weeks later did my colleagues tell me there was a DIY store really close to the office. Handy...
So anyway, as this was right around the time that London was going a bit crazy about knives in public (some crazy kids decided that stabbing people was fun), this ball had to look dangerous but had to be completely harmless to avoid any problems. I used craft foam to make the rim, and... wait for it... earplugs on toothpicks for the spikes!! I then cut the earplugs to shape and asked the bf to spraypaint the whole thing silver. Little did I know not to use normal spray paint on styrofoam as the whole thing started melting... He didnt know either so I guess am not that blonde ;) NOW I know this though hihi... So the Ball of Death had a few dimples... Nothing major though. One silver spiky ball achieved.
Close but no cigar. I still had to add the chains... Luckily my friend brought me a range of chains to chose from so I went off and checked what I could use for this. I chose the smallest chain tp glue around the ball:
Looking pretty good already huh? Really, I cant tell you how proud I was of this... The hole where I stuck the ball on a very large toothpick (one of those shashlik ones) came in handy when having to attach the large chain. I painted the top of a milk bottle silver, cut a slit in it, screwed a hook into the ball where the hole was, and glued the bottle cap on top with the hook sticking through the lid. Sounds confusing? I mean this:
Because, looking back at the reference, this is what it looks like. -Ish anyway LOL. Oh yes, I also need to add the chain... so I looked a keyring through the hook and attached a large plastic (also health and safety approved) to the it as well. The chain was a white one that I had to spray paint silver also. It was a little larger than in the reference but it still looked good. This is the final result of Gogo's Ball of Death:
The handle was a toilet roll covered in tape with yet another keyring. Not bad huh?? And it worked too!
Here I am on the night itself happily swinging my Ball of Death. Yes, I look way too happy about that LOL
This was my best reference and comparison. Ignore my posing, I really must practice... But with a few items from the charity shop and some craftiness, I managed to get the look quite well :) And at least everyone recognised the character and I had no problems getting in with my very dangerous looking but really kitty-safe Ball of Death :)I hope you enjoyed reading about this as much as I did making it :) I know Halloween is over, but my costuming never stops ;) You'll see as it will be SantaCon in a mere three weeks, wait until you see my costume for that!!
For all my new followers, thank you so much and dont forget to enter my giveaway! You have until midnight tonight UK time. I'm off to get some brekkie now, enjoy your Saturday!
love it. great costume!
ReplyDeleteROFL Ball of death? Love your train of thought! You should have introduced your former neighbors to it, lass.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for your lovely comment- enjoy your weekend!
What a cute project! I am your newest follower! You can follow my blog at http://craftycierra.blogspot.com/
ReplyDeleteLet me know if your interested in a blog swap! CierraLarsen@hotmail.com Thanks!
/Cierra
Spec. Tac. Ular. My daughter, who cosplays like a maniac, is uber impressed as well! We love your costuming capabilities over here and totally bow down!
ReplyDelete