Sewing with anxiety

Sewing machines make me cry, you guys. It is a proven fact.

Every September when the children start discussing Halloween costumes, I break out in hives. There is always a 100 percent chance that one or both of their costumes will require some amount of sewing.

You may ask me: Jenn, why, in this digital age of amazon and Etsy would you not just ORDER a costume for the little candy hoarding demons–I MEAN precious, precious angel babies?

Because, in case you haven’t been following along, my family is weird and some things that our kids want do not even exist on the internet.

Case in point: Minun. Dumb name for an electric type Pokémon whose symbol is the negative dash. Get it?

It could have been worse. I had to put my foot down and declare that any Pokémon costume we choose has to be vaguely humanoid shaped. I can’t even think about Greninja or whatever without breathing into a paper bag.

The 5yo decided on Pikachu, bless him and crown him, the child who knows his parents’ limitations. Done and ordered in 5 seconds. I MIGHT NOT EVEN STEAL YOUR REESES THIS YEAR, sweet, considerate cherub.

But for the 8yo — who has a mind of his own and does not give a hoot about Mommy’s desperate need for a nap — I had to improvise literally the day before the kids’ first trick or treat event. (Yeah, see, now kids go to like 17 events over two weeks to receive buckets of candy. It’s ok though, because it stays on the pantry shelf and lasts until Easter.)

The other day, the actual skilled sewer in the house — their father, who studied textile chemistry and engineering and I’m not sure what all else — hit a mental wall with the sewing machine and could not finish. Just bone tired. Could not get it done. I get it, this happens to me all the time. He’s allowed one day to be imperfect.

So the next morning I went to the craft store, grabbed some flannel, glue sticks and a reindeer antler headband.

I sewed a set of Minun ears and a tail with a hot glue gun, you guys.

I’m not gonna sit here and say it was easy. I am STILL catching up on my sleep from that mess.

In fact I’m so tired I am going to shut up and just show you the photos as a step-by-step. You know, just in case you feel like punishing your own fingers with hot glue while watching true crime docs on Netflix at 12:30 am on a Wednesday.

See those cute little reindeer ears? They are about to be murdered.

But first I made a pattern.

Then I marked it out on the flannel. I gave myself a very generous margin of error because… this is a hot mess mama sewing with hot glue.

Someday, I might speak to a professional about why I enjoyed cutting off these ears but today is not that day. It’s Halloween, people.

Then I cut out the yellow shapes and left tabs on the bottom to wrap around the headband.

Then, I pinned it together and glued one edge before slipping the ear over top of the antler, stuffing it with whatever, and gluing the other side shut.

And voila. Is it perfect? Not at all. But it’s DONE.

It’s not going to win any cosplay prizes. All things being equal, it took way longer to glue than to sew. But there are factors, and nothing is equal.

If you factor in the crying, the breaking of machine needles, and the existential crises of simply being unable to thread and re-thread a haunted machine that hates me, hot glueing the ever-loving fire out of scraps of flannel was way more worth my time than sewing. Not even a contest.

Happy Halloween! Thank you for reading this far; I’m pretty impressed. We will always have our lights on for the likes of you. I might even raid some of my kids’ Reese’s for you.