Gearing up for Fastelavn...make your own Dr Zoidberg outfit

You'll need:

A twitty piglet

Some orange material

An orange ski hat if you can get one

A little white material for eyes

A tiny bit of black seethrough material for the pupils

An old white shirt

a length of elastic

An old CD

Two pairs of Marigold gloves (one for feet, unless you're not quite such a twitty piglet ;o)

Here's the hat we found at the charity shop.
We pulled the inside out...

Cut one end off (while it wasn't on his head)...

Turned it inside out, put it on his head and marked gently 
in felt pen where the mouth and eye holes should go. 

Then we stitched on a washing up glove stuffed with kitchen roll
 (actually we used toilet roll but that doesn't sound as refined).

Here you can see how we cut out and stitched on 
two big round eye balls with smaller black pupils.

Drew some claws on a newspaper much bigger than Jake's hands
and then cut them out of the material and stitched them together.
And last of all Jake put on the shirt and we made a band of elastic
with an old CD attached to it to finish the look.

Here's the real thing.

HAVE FUN!!!!

Make your own Yoda costume - or role playing cloak

YODA without his green makeup cos he's got a cold and has to keep wiping his nose...

Need you will:

1. A fair amount of fleece material or an old blanket.

2. One pair of pig's ears from the pet shop (it took a while to find one left one and one right one that were the same size) or make some out of an old cereal box

3. One swimming hat, perhaps or a 'bald man's wig like the one Jake's brother bought for being Dr Phil at a High School party. I've got a photo but had better wait til he says I can post it.... He said yes..

I bought that book and it really works...Alex's girlfriend is LOVELY.

Turn the wig inside out, stick some of the hair from the inside on the outside, cut slits and poke the ears through, tape them on tight - I think we used green insulation tape - and then spray the whole thing green. 

There you go. Mind out for high winds.

Here it is from the back.

Then this bit will be a bit hard to explain because I made this cloak 
for the big boys a decade ago. Basically, its rectangles. We got a dressing gown (bath robe for our American friends :o) and used that for a pattern. 
But to give it a bit more shape and bulk, I put tucks in the shoulders - see above...

And believe it or not the hood is a rectangle this tall with tucks around the neck.

That means when it's on it drapes nicely - and fits kids for a lot longer :o).

Here are the tucks round the neckline. Not too neat and tidy but fleece doesn't unravel.

And here's a family portrait at the opening night of one of the Star Wars films at a big cinema in Copenhagen. We messed up booking the tickets online and ended up sitting around two poor strangers who hadn't dressed up at all. Jake's seat number was called out during a draw and we all cheered like crazy when he went up on stage with his light sabre and collected a great poster and some pretty rare photos. The strangers took a while to recover.

But we take our hats, cloaks and almost everything else off to this Jabba the Hutt the boys met in Germany at the Star Wars Convention. What a hero!!!!! And goodness knows what's under there. Probably tent poles and years of doughnuts!

Gearing up for Fastelavn...

More photos of the Jedi adventure last summer

The WORST thing about big brothers, cousins and their friends is that they can
drive you round the bend with tickling and stuff.
The BEST thing about big brothers, cousins and their friends is that they can DRIVE.

All the way from Denmark to Germany, singing wacky songs. Phew! 
If you think these guys look scary, just wait and see what kind of monsters 
you find at a real Star Wars Convention!

Some of them were cute and friendly, like R2D2.

Some of them didn't want to be recognised,
so they bought masks over the internet. Clever. 
Are they in a toilet???

Jake met the guy from inside the Wookie suit. WOW!

Somebody else met somebody else.
Bit cold for bikinis now, though.

In fact storm troopers are a better match for 
the weather in Denmark right now.

Our little Yoda was brave enough to sidled up to one...
though it might be Bart Simpson in disguise.

And the guys spent a long afternoon looking at starships
and taking photos on their phones. More than this probably, but
the others are no doubt censored. Anyway, here's a starship behind Jake.

And then when it finally got dark and it was time to leave, they all climbed back aboard 'The Green Lightning' (my Suzuki Wagon R+), and headed for home. They made it back safely too but not without having an adventure of their own on the way when they got stopped by a German Highway Patrol who thought they were returning from a music festival.

After passing an alcohol test with flying colours and despite the fact that naughty Zac put his hand up in front of the police officer's face like a Jedi doing a mind trick and said he would not need to see identification, they were waved on their way with a smile. Lucky the policeman had a sense of humour :o). And lucky Jake has BRILLIANT BIG BROTHERS, COOL COUSIN CHRISTIAN and MAGNIFICENT MADS who all like getting into the right gear to have lots of fun.

There might be some inspiration for costumes in the photos above, otherwise watch this space for close-ups of the Yoda headgear and another fun character, Dr Zoidberg and more in the run up to Fastelavn on 2 March. (Jake's in bed right now so I can't go rooting through his dressing up stuff without waking him and Dr Watson)

Dr Watson and the mystery of the snowman's smile...

Jake came dashing indoors and started rooting through the kitchen. "It's snowing," he called. "This salami has been in the fridge for 3 months, Mum. Can I use it for my snowman?" 

When I'd established it was for a mouth, I said yes, good idea, and made a mental note to do some stock clearance in among the pickle jars before too long

. 

And here he is, Jake's snowman! Watson helped, of course.
With a lovely carrot for his nose....
BUT...

Where is the snowman's salami mouth???
If you look closely, you can see the groove where it used to be...
but now it's nowhere to be seen, unless you follow the tracks and come with me...

What's that? Has Dr Watson taken up the nasty habit of smoking?

Or could it be that he has 'found' 

THE SNOWMAN'S SMILE!!!!

Hmmmm or rather zzzzzzz
I don't think the snowman minds too much, though.
He's already fast asleep, leaning back on a garden chair.
And at the rate the snow is melting out there,
by morning he'll have disappeared altogether-
just like the sausage in a naughty dog's tummy.
Abra cadabra, Alimentary, my dear Watson,

New president for Denmark

Look familiar?

Yes, Jake was voted President after he and his classmates held New Year's speeches
(based on the traditional speech held by the Danish and English Queens).

Reasons for him being elected included:

* his was the longest speech (without changing the typeface to size 28)

* he explained what the long words meant (like expropriation - which I had to look up to check the spelling 100% :o)

* his speech was acclaimed better than the Queen's - who is a little stuck because she can't be political and criticise the government for putting train fairs up despite promising to reducing them

* and it probably helped that he wore the tail coat we got him for being an usher at his cousin's wedding and ring bearer at ours last year  

Laura was a smashing bridesmaid too at the civil ceremony in Denmark,
where they were allowed to ring the bell at the town hall.

He gets our vote! Neon laces and all!

Snow in the US but spring in Denmark???

Here's a pretty little tree with blossom on it. In Denmark. In January!!!!

And before you start worrying that I've left a candle burning and call the Fure Brigade...

...let me reassure you that this was a beautiful rainbow that Watson
and I saw this morning as the sun came up. 

Happy New Year, everyone

Here are Jake's big brothers Zac and Alex having some fun at their rehearsal studio - clear proof that sticking at your guitar lessons is better than wasting ALL your time on Facebook  :o)

Press here for GREAT MUSIC!!!!

And yes, Jake looks a lot like Zac ;o). Alex looks more like me, and Bob Dylan :o))