Halloween Costume Idea- Cave Girl

I always want to do something awesome for Halloween and it never really happens.  The internet tells me I can make a mummy costume, or become a lego version of myself with only my innate make-up ability and 10 minutes.  That way ends in disaster.

I also want to go for something scary, rather than all the silly popular culture inspired ones that proliferate the interwebs, but that limits the options further. I went for something in the middle, not a witch or vampire but also not a humanoid emoji or confectionery item.   I chose cave girl.

Pumpkin Soup

Hey, it’s autumn.  (Or Fall, if you’re that way inclined…) And for about 3 weeks of the year there are pumpkins in the shops and then we forget they exist again, kind of like the vegetable version of tennis with Halloween being Wimbledon…

Anyway, here is my recipe for Pumpkin Soup:

• 1 Small Pumpkin
• 1 Carrot
• 1 Parsnip
• 1 Onion
• 650ml Veg Stock
• 125ml Milk
• 1tsp Cinnamon
• 1 Dollop of Margarine

1. Chop the veg, for the pumpkin you’ll need to scoop out the seeds first, then scoop out the flesh.
2. Melt the marge in a saucepan then add and fry the onion until soft.
3. Add the stock and other veg and simmer for 20 mins.
4. Remove from heat and add the milk and cinnamon, then blend until smooth.
5. Heat up again if needs be and eat.  This made about 2 portions for me so I froze the rest for another day.

So that’s my soup, last year I roasted some pumpkin.
Anyone else do anything else exciting with a pumpkin…?

Halloween Decorations

Oh I had so many plans and ideas but then I just couldn’t really be bothered…but I did make some Halloween decorations…

This is a pumpkin lantern (in the Americas they are called Jack-O-Lanterns, but in the Englands they are called pumpkins…I think because we don’t really do pumpkins for anything other than making them into lanterns we don’t actually need another name for them).

So you get a pumpkin and cut around the stem to make it’s little hat.  Then scoop out the seeds and flesh.  The cut out the face, I have seen some really creative carving but mine was a little simpler!  It’s not even that scary!

And all you need is a tealight inside, and it’s usually a good idea to light it and leave the top of the lantern off to allow the flame to grow or you’ll cut off the oxygen supply and kill it!

And I also made this!  It’s a felt pumpkin.  I like felt…

I cut out 8 leave shapes (rounded diamonds, do they have another name?) and sewed them together to make a misshapen sphere, with the top and bottom slightly open.  The I added a square of green felt to the bottom and sewed it closed. I filled the pumpkin with toy stuffing and sewed the top closed, as I did I inserted some green felt for the stem.

 

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The Guardian has a nice gallery of ‘extreme cakes’  featuring unicorn poop and severed hands. Here’s some red velvet open wounds by Jacqui Kelly Cake Revolution:

Not actually sure I could stomach them…

Halloween Costume- Cave Girl Style

It’s hard to come up with a good Halloween costume that is awesome and achievable (I’m a firm believer in making rather than buying costumes) that reflects your personality.  Unfortunately. for this chilly feminist fancy dress for ladies is usually an exercise in how to look as much like stripper as possible which largely just looks like you’ve forgotten how to get dressed (your clothes should cover your underwear, your underwear should cover your body).

 

 

Anyway ranting aside I turned towards Mr Benn for my inspiration: I decided to be fierce (do people still say that?) and go prehistoric- see Cave Man Benn bottom left.  I bought some leopard print fabric for £7 and create a simple wrap around dress (literally a rectangle of fabric wrapped round with elastic in the top to hold it up and I cut the bottom to make it look ragged) which was fairly shapeless so I added a shredded bit of fabric as a belt.  I added a shoulder strap to help keep the dress up. I took some white foam and cut it into bone shapes and strung them together to make a necklace and one large bone to put in my hair (I admit to gross stereotyping when assuming cave girl style).

 

I made this costume last year and never ore it because I had horrible food poisoning just before Halloween and hadn’t quite recovered so I’m reusing it.  But I did make a little matching bag this year which seemed to have been an oversight last time around.  There was some intense backcombing of my hair as well!