Princess Mulan's Matchmaker Hanfu

Made It!!!

The girls have been wishing for Princess Mulan dresses for quite some time. I finally found time to get to the fabric store and while I was there, I actually remembered to grab up some pretty blue fabric for the waist band. Really, that's what the big wait was all about. I've had the pink satin and the red trim for quite some time.

I only made one dress because my older girl is growing out of the dress up stage and she would rather wear something normal but themed. I haven't figured out what to do for her yet, but I did buy some Star Wars fabric for when I figure something out. In the meantime, only one hanfu is in order. Which works because Libby's 5th birthday was quickly approaching so the dress could be a gift. 

It only took me a couple of days to make the dress, which would equate to a couple of hours in normal person time. It's been proven many times that I am not functioning in any level of normal, sewing or otherwise. But it should be noted that it was a quick project.

I used a normal looking dress pattern, mainly for the measurements of the shoulders and sleeves and bodice width. The hanfu does not at all resemble the pattern I used, but I am growing out of a need for much of a pattern; I just need the major cutting points and then I can wing the rest of it.

I made the hanfu just like a dress in that it has a top bodice section and a bottom skirt with a zipper up the back. I'm not so sure that is the proper way but I wanted it to have some flair at the bottom and I wasn't so sure a shift or A line cut would have the same effect. Besides, the gathered waistline would be covered by the waist band so it didn't really matter. I also made the skirt ankle length (or so I thought until my kid put it on and I discovered her legs are a lot longer than they used to be!)

I cut the sleeves the right length and then added "bat wings" to the wrist. I also made the tip of the wings longer than the top of the wrist so that it resembled Mulan's long sleeve tips without going overboard. Just a bit of effect for authenticity but not enough that it would be annoying to wear.

The bodice top gave me some pause. I had to think about how to make it overlap like a robe. I ended up cutting four bodice pieces and then folding them and ironing them down the way I wanted them, trimming off the unwanted half at the diagonal and stitching the two pieces of bodice together at the waist. It has a lining of the same satin, which is why I needed four pieces. Two outer and two for lining. There is probably a hundred easier and more conservative ways to cut the bodice out, but to keep it straight in my mind, that's how I did it. I will have to practice or draw up a little pattern piece.

I used some of the leftover cheap red stuff that I used for the Captain Hook Halloween costume last year to trim the bodice and make the red waist belt. The embroidered blue piece was easy to make into a waistband. I measure the child around the middle and made a rectangle to match. I sewed the red band to the middle of the blue rectangle and added apron ties.

Now I had the pink satin underdress with the red trim on the bodice and the separate blue and red waist band. Done!

There were just a couple of problems. I forgot the red upper skirt and the waist band slid straight down that satin covered kid. It wouldn't stay up.

I added a piece of gathered red to the bottom of the blue waist band and that fixed that issue. Then I tacked the waist band to the dress in the back, front and under the arms to keep it from sliding down. We don't need to spend all day yanking the waist piece up over and over again. Now, it's done!

Princess Mulan's pink hanfu was an awesome birthday gift for my little birthday girl! We hauled it around all day at Disneyland on her big day, but it was too hot to wear satin. Also, Mulan wasn't "home" when we went to the Princess Fantasy Faire. In the evening when it cooled down, she put her hanfu on over her clothes in lieu of a jacket.  It was so cute!  We sure heard a lot of compliments in the couple of hours that she wore it and her little friend instructed me to make one for her and her sister.

Happy Birthday to my little princess!

*** UPDATE ***
11/8/2013

My little Mulan met the real Mulan at Disneyland. Mulan saw her and gasped with excitement! She was like a little princess on Christmas morning when she saw Libby in her Mulan hanfu! Very exciting! Here are the princess twins together:

Princess Merida dresses

Fresh from under my sewing machine - a dress to "change your fate!"  The perfect dress for "climbing Crown's Tooth and drinking from the fire falls". Just right for a girl who wants "to stay single, hair flowing in the wind while riding through the glen firing arrows into the sunset."

I may have seen the movie Brave a few too many times since the dialogue is so easy for me to quote!

I started working on these dresses a long time ago. The fabric came from Joann Fabrics and was probably a seasonal print. It's various shades of dark green with a clover print. I don't remember where I got the gold; it was either Joanns or Hobby Lobby. The green is a cotton broadcloth and the gold is a glitter infused polyester. Unfortunately, the gold is rough and itchy.

I raided the donation bag (why do we always have a bag of worn, neglected, unloved clothes? I always think I cleaned out all the old stuff, and as soon as I donate it all, we start another bag)  for old black Tshirts. Score!  Lining for the dresses is soft black Tshirt cotton.  I lined the front of the bodice, and the inside of the sleeves with what I cut from the Tshirts. I had a bit of the bottom of a bright yellow Tshirt from a day that I trimmed off the bottom of a Tshirt to make a comfy play dress for my daughter (that she has not  yet worn, arg) and lined the backside of the gold collar ruffle. Ahh, anti-itch softness next to the skin! My girls are officially spoiled!

I didn't have a pattern to work from, although there's probably one out there on the market. I just decided to wing it. After carefully looking at pictures of the dress from the movie, the Disney store, and the princess herself in Disneyland, I came up with what I think is authentic yet kid-friendly.  In the movie, Merida rides her horse, climbs a mountain, goes fishing in the creek, runs, jumps, eats, and more all in this dress. My kids will be just as active in it, but I'm keeping them off of horses and away from bears.

The sleeves and shoulders were the most difficult part of this dress. I cut the sleeves in half and then cut out a good three inch strip from each. Once I had a lower and an upper sleeve, I inserted a strip of gold in a lightly gathered sort of way. I also made little belt loop type strips and stuck three into the mix to make it look suspended. For the shoulder suspension, I just added the rufled gold strip on top of the shoulder seam and it worked! I'm happy with the way the sleeves and shoulders turned out! I opted not to add gold to the wrists too; let's face it, these girls are going to drag the edges of these sleeves through ketchup, chocolate, dirt, and many many other sticky things. The laundry factor plays a role in the design as well.

After making four lovely suspended sleeves, I added two of them to Libby's dress. The next day I discovered that they just looked weird somehow. Low and behold, I put a size 4 sleeve on the left and a size 8 sleeve on the right! The joys of making identical dresses! Since her arms are both the same size, I had to fix that.

I was going to put the sleeves on Gracie's dress, but it was 86 degrees out and the forcast looks about the same for the next week. Summer is coming too. What was I thinking making lined long sleeves for a girl who never gets cold? I decided to put her long sleeves in the bottom drawer where they will never be seen again, and give her a sleeveless Merida dress. I gave the dress some little cap sleeves, even though I vowed to never do that again because the cap sleeves crack me up too much. They are so funny looking! They stick out like little wings. But, it works on this dress and with the gold on the shoulder, there had to be something. She didn't want short puff sleeves, so funny little wings it is. That's ok, laughter is good for me.

I could not find a good ribbon for the bottom hem. After searching and searching, literally for months, I settled for the black ribbon with a Greek key pattern, or maybe it's Egyptian. Greek/Egyptian ribbon and Irish clovers on a Scottish princess dress. Eh, the kids will never know.  The ribbon does give the hem a finished look and the Disneyland Merida has lots of fanciness at the bottom of her dress, so I had to add something.

The belt is just some brown polyester and I made a gigantic button out of a piece of cardboard covered with the gold fabric. I'm not entirely happy with it, but once I get the plaid piece attached, that will make it much better. Merida has a Scottish plaid hand-towel or snuggle blanket or handkerchief something to that effect hanging from her belt. Whatever it is, I'll make one and attach it. I did not realize that blue/green plaid would be so hard to find in the spring. So far, no luck. I might have to add a blue/green floral print instead. I believe the plaid symbolizes the family clan and if that is true, our clan pattern will be flowery. Why not!  In the movie, she has a quiver hanging from her belt, so if I cannot find a good clan piece, I'll whip up a quiver instead. I love having options.

I put a metal zipper on my four year old's dress and she promptly told me, "Can you make a placket for the zipper so it won't touch me?" Yes, child, you can have a placket. Any four year old who knows what a placket is deserves to have one.

I've decided the ultimate finishing touch would be for the girls to have mops of big red curly hair. Yeah, umm... no. they'll just be wearing the hair they were born with: straight, tangled, mousey-brown. Maybe a red hair clip?

All  that is left to do is take these dresses for a test run at Disneyland. Once the girls put them through a full day of activity, eating, sweating, spilling and such then we will know whether the dresses are a success or not. Stay tuned!

*Update:  I found a piece of plaid! A long lost pair of winter flannel pajama pants resurfaced from the depths of my dresser drawers. The two legs became the plaid kerchiefs and now I have a pair of plaid pajama shorts! Ta-Da!

Disneyland Day - First Trip this year!

Sunday, November 11th, 2012

We had such a fun day! I'm going to write about all of our Disneyland trips in as much detail as I can because they are very special days and I am not trying to flaunt and embellish, just trying to record great memories and reflect on our magical lucky days. Warning: this is going to be a long post!

Since we are beyond the diaper and nap stage of life now, I can pack lighter for days out.  I brought our ears, Libby's blankey, and a few snacks. Plus, I brought our Princess Encyclopedia. It's a big picture book of princesses and it has pretty pictures of each of them. It's a lot to lug around, but we keep it in the basket of the stroller so it really isn't a big deal. And, I kept a sharpie marker in my purse. We got the book at the Scholastic Book Fair last year and took it one other time. That time we got only one autograph, but it was Dr. Faciler from The Princess and the Frog, an unusual character so it was pretty cool!

I decided to ignore the electronic sign on Ball Ave that says (and probably always does) to turn left on Harbor Blvd for Theme Park Parking. I prefer the Mickey and Friends parking structure since it is a lot closer and takes less time to get to and from the vehicle to the park. Bad idea. The M&F structure had cones in front of it and the traffic was routed around to the Toy Story parking lots just off of Harbor Blvd. This took an hour! I should have obeyed the sign and saved myself 45 minutes at the very least.  Live and learn, this included parking. I don't know why I can never manage to get in there. I have parked in there just enough times to know it's where I'd prefer to park. Oh well, we parked in the Woody lot and rode the bus to the park. We didn't get a blue Toy Story bus though, they tossed in an extra bus since it was a busy day and we ended up on that one. It was fine, plenty of room and easy enough to board and hop off with the kids, bag and stroller, but it wasn't blue with Toy Story characters painted on it. So, the bus got a big "awww" from the kids, but they were happy to hop on instead of wait for a blue bus; guess it wasn't that big of a deal after all.

First stop: Ticket booth. Tickets are available online which would save time, but I decided to buy our passes at the park for two reasons: 1. We were going on a SoCal Select Blockout day and buying online would have blocked us out that day, but buying tickets at the gate you can get in that day and buy the same pass that would have blocked you out but you don't have to buy a blockout ticket ($70 each) on that day. So, buying at the gate you can go any day you want to and still get the SoCal Select pass and get in the park too.  2. It's more exciting and fun this way!

We waited in line for 15 - 20 minutes, it probably would have taken me longer to navigate the website and print out my e-ticket if I had done it at home. Time saved = none. We bought three SoCal Select Annual Passes and a parking pass. Since I already paid $15 to park, that price was refunded to me. Walt sure does charge a premium to visit his park, but we will make the most of it!

We entered Disneyland first (as opposed to California Adventure) and since our passes were brand spanking new, we had to get our photos taken. The photos are no longer on the pass, but on the computer. When the gate keeper scans your pass, your photo pops up on his screen.  There were lots of photopass photographers right there in the entryway, but they were in training, so it was actually difficult to get anyone to take our pictures even though it looked like a swarm of Disney photographers were ready. They weren't. We got it done though, and had a group photo taken in front of the Mickey Mouse flowers too.

We entered Main Street and were struck by the magical "awe" that is Disneyland! Being there in person is amazing! It was all decorated for the Christmas Holidays! So pretty!  Mickey and Minnie were both on Main Street doing "meet and greet".  The girls wanted to see Minnie and I wanted to see Mickey, but I was persuaded by their big eyes and happy smiles so we visited Minnie Mouse.  The characters don't always stay long and you are never guaranteed that you can see one or another, and the girls really seem to understand the hit and miss way of the Main Street characters. It's been a whole year since there were here and they have amazing memories for being such young things.

Minnie was great!  I had Gracie  hand her the book and I opened it to the front cover. This is the moment where I notice that Gracie had written her name on the front cover as well. That's fine, but the book should be for both of them, so after Minnie signed it I had Libby sign her name there as well. Minnie even wrote "To Gracie"!

We went up Main Street and the wonderful sugary smells were strong today. I love the way Disneyland smells! It's one of my favorite things about the parks. Can  you say that about Six Flags? Nope!

Our first stop was "the hub" to admire the statue of Walt Disney and Mickey. Gracie and Libby know him as "Mickey's Daddy" and they like to stop and see the statue and see what color flowers are planted around him. The flowers are different at different times of the year, always fun to see them.

Onward to the castle!  Passing under the castle archway is a thrill! First we stopped in the handicap accessible room which is a very nice little room filled with royal trinkets. It's a small little space with a video playing of the castle walk-through that goes over the castle which is mostly stairs. But of course, it is done up Disney style and it's very beautiful. Then we went into the Sleeping Beauty walk-through up over the castle arch and down the other side. As expected, Libby was brave as long as she held my hand and Gracie was afraid of the section where Malificent's shadow appears and her evil laughter comes out of the speaker. We watched Sleeping Beauty's dress turn from blue to pink and back again before we left. We left when it was pink, of course.

The aptly named by my daughter, "Mary Poppins Band" was playing in front of the Bibbidti Boppity Boo shop and we listened for a bit. The next song they played was from Beauty and the Beast, which Libby recognized right away. Since she was dressed as Belle, she caught the reference and beamed! She was thrilled that they played a song for her! Along came Mary and Bert, they were walking with a little girl who was wearing a Mary Poppins dress and she was just adorable. The band played a show tune from that movie for them. They didn't perform but they did dance with the children who were there and Gracie asked Mary to sign her book. We didn't get a signature from Bert, maybe next time.

Next Gracie tried to pull the sword from the stone and become the ruler of Disneyland. She tried her best, but that sword wouldn't budge from the anvil. I recently read somewhere that there is an ipad app that will unlock the sword and  you can pull it up from the stone, but not completely out and go running off with it. I do not have an iphone so I don't know if this is true, but it's always worth a try!

Finally, we can make our way to the restroom! That's my only complaint about Disneyland: I wish there were bathrooms as you enter the center of the resort, before you go into the gate and enter Disneyland or California Adventure. After a long car ride and then the shuttle to the park, a restroom would be handy dandy before the excitement of entering Disneyland! There are two bathrooms right as you enter Main Street, but who wants to stop right when you first enter the magical land of enchantment? My favorite bathroom, "the hidden bathroom" on the left side of the castle was gone! It was behind a construction wall, looks like they are improving that area so we went to the right and used the Queen of Hearts restroom.

The Princess line-up has been moved to the stage area where the villians have their meet-and-greet in October. Hmmm, are they improving the Princess Fantasy Faire? That line is always long and it's a hard one to stand in without much for distracting entertainment. Hopefully, they are at least improving the queue! We wanted to visit princesses of course, so we hopped in line to see them. One nice thing about having them in this new location is that the kids can see the princesses visiting with everyone while waiting your turn. More fun while you wait. The line wasn't extremely long, but plenty long enough. Ready to greet us were Ariel, Cinderella and Tiana. We found the right pages in our princess book for them to sign autographs. About halfway there, the princesses all left the stage and there was a bit of a break in the action. Two new princesses came to replace the three that left. We met Jasmine and Belle. Not sure why the third space wasn't filled, but the girls were happy to meet two of them anyway. We were able to get them to sign their pages in the book. This book is going to be fun!

Small World had an unbelievably long line, so we decided to skip that and come to it another day. We were all too excited to do anything that had a line that long! Right across from Small World was Merida! The new movie "Brave" just might end up under our Christmas tree this year. We saw the movie in June at the theater with Fenna as one of the last things we did together. It's no surprise that the girls were super excited to meet the princess Merida. She didn't have a page in our book since we bought it before her movie came out, but she signed a spot on the back page. The page has each princess with her prince and she commented that she doesn't have a prince, but she'd sign there at the top anyway. I think we should get a Brave storybook and have her sign it. We could start a collection of books if we keep going back! Why not! Merida was magical! She took her time with the girls and gave them the special attention that one can only hope for. I was wishing that the weather was a bit warmer because she was wearing her cloak over her dress and I was dying to see that costume! Maybe next time.

I love being able to say that! "Next time!"

While we were in line to visit Merida, we decided to call the Grandmas to tell them Thank you and let them know we were having a fun day at Disneyland. We got to talk to Great Grandma and we told her that we were there and having fun. It was hard to hear anything with all of the noise surrounding us, but we said our Thanks into the phone and the little girls had a lot of excitement in their voices, so I think that worked out well.

As soon as we hung up, I got a text from my friend. When I talked to her the day before, I told her about our exciting gift of passes and that I was planning to bring the girls this weekend. Their family also has passes, but one step up from the passes we have which allows them to go on Sundays. Her text message said she was at California Adventure and wondered if we made it to Disneyland today or not. I replied and we decided to try to meet up in front of the Ariel ride, which is a long way from where we were presently.

Secretly, I did not want to try to plan to meet up with anyone on our first day back. I knew I would be too excited and I didn't want to be watching the time and trying to steer the girls toward a designated meeting spot, and keeping all of this on the back of my mind on our first day back. I just wanted to be sucked up in the Disney excitement and forget the rest of the world. Which is pretty much what happened! But since this was not really planned and there was no pressure to actually meet up, we were just going to try to find each other but if we didn't then we would just laugh about it later, there wasn't any of that planning or pressure that I was avoiding. Actually, since we were on opposite ends of the Disneyland Resort, it was going to be hard to time it right anyway. Luckily, I have great friends and there was no real pressure to make this happen. We can plan to do a Disney day another time together. My friend was just saying that she was thinking of us and happy for us, and for that I only felt more loved than I already felt  that day. Magic! 

After we visited with Merida, we boarded the train which goes all the way around Disneyland with several stops in between. The train took us through the facade of The Small World and on to Tomorrow Land, then Main Street. We got off at Main Street.

While on Main Street we saw the Disneyland Fire Fighters play a couple of songs and then we went to the entry where the Mickey Mouse flowers are. What! Princesses! There was Snow White, Ariel and Cinderella! We were able to meet with two of them, but then the lines grew way too long. They must have just come out when we did because we didn't wait long at all to see Ariel and Snow White. Gracie was really happy to get more autographs in her book.

When we entered California Adventure, I handed over our passes to the gate keeper and she asked, "did you just buy these today?" For a moment, I thought we weren't going to be able to get in since it was a blocked out day for those passes, and now we were in between parks!  Maybe you can only get in once and our day was done! oh no! I should have stayed in Disneyland! I told her "Yes, today." And she said, "Have fun!" and let us through. Whew! I told the girls I really want to ride the Ariel ride before we go to Cars Land. They were dying to see Cars Land! But they can't say no to Ariel, and it's not far from the entrance.

But wait! A street show! Mickey Mouse and maybe it's the Newsies? Whoever they were, it was a great show. We stopped to watch them sing and dance. It was a back-in-time sort of performance and Mickey Mouse was heading to California to build Disneyland with just a suitcase and a dream. Very cute!

Onward. Where were we going? Oh yes, the Ariel ride. The girls' favorite!

Guess who we saw in front of the Ariel ride? The girls' best friends! It was awesome that worked out so well! We couldn't have planned it if we tried. The tiny amount of planning that went into meeting up was insignificant to the amount of planning it should have taken for this to actually happen. Funny how things work out. They told me they actually hadn't planned on being at Disneyland in the afternoon, they wanted to come in the morning and leave by 1pm so their girls would nap on the way home, but they changed their plans last minute and decided to spend the afternoon and evening at Disneyland instead of the morning. Since they knew we might be there, they took a shot in the dark and sent a text wondering if we were there. Actually finding one another was amazing too, it was a very busy day in the park. As soon as we approached the Ariel ride, they did too! Timing was great!

We rode the Ariel ride all together. There wasn't a line at all, we walked right on! How exciting!

When we came out of the ride, Phineas and Ferb were singing and dancing right in front of us! Gracie, Jillian and Mallory danced with the Fireside Girls and Libby watched. She was wearing down.

After that, as promised, we went to Cars Land. Our friends wanted to go there too, so we all went together. It was much more fun to be together! Cars Land is amazing! It looks and feels like you are walking in the movie, right there in Radiator Springs. We loved it!  It was crowded though and lines were long. The lines for the rides were way too long. One ride had a 120 minute wait!

Libby was getting tired and hungry at this point. Gracie didn't care if she was hungry, she was too excited. We decided to ride one ride, after all, we were there! We chose the ride with the short line, only 35 minute wait time and hopped in line. Gracie was through the roof excited! This kid knew the entire dialog of the movie when she was still in diapers. However, Libby found her melting point. Gracie rode Luigi's Tires with our friends and I took Libby for a stroll. 

Gracie had such a great time on the ride. It was like bumper cars. Libby enjoyed the stroll. Libby and I wandered all around Cars Land. We both loved the canyon scenery. So beautiful! Even though it is just a facade, it looked so real!

We also saw Mater, Lightning McQueen and DJ.  DJ did a little dance show with the waitresses from Flo's V8 Cafe. Gracie and our friends were off of the ride at this point and we found them easily. Time to eat! The kids were starving. I brought little snacks, but nothing with sustenance. We walked over to the Food Court near Paradise Pier.

Libby wanted a $12 bowl of macaroni and cheese from Flo's V8 Cafe. Luckily, I talked her into a $6 Asian kids meal instead. Gracie wanted an Asian bowl too. I got that for both of them, but they didn't eat it. It was too spicy and had rice instead of noodles. Aaah, well, we tried!  I had a burrito from the Mexican counter. It was delicious! Gracie ate half of it and I ate part of her Asian bowl. Libby nibbled at things and the kids all talked and chattered away. It was so much fun to sit and eat with our friends in the middle of California Adventure!

Something horribly embarrassing, but really funny happened while we were eating. I was having a conversation with Brian (J&M's daddy) and eating at the same time. Not especially polite, but I had to shovel it in to keep up with the kids and actually get something to eat too.  I was replying to him and a surprise loud burp came out of me! Sneak Attack! Oh it was a big one! We laughed so hard, I couldn't believe it! This is what friends are for, to laugh at and with us. 

I decided our day was going to have to be over. I wanted to stay all evening and into the night, but I didn't think the kids were going to be able to last that long (well, one of 'em anyway).

The night show I really wanted to see is Fantasmic. I've never seen it! It was at 9pm, and probably lasts a half an hour or so, then there would be the crowd of people leaving at the same time; I'm sure it would be awfully late by the time we got home if we stay to watch it. They only have that show on weekends though, so I was hoping to see it today. Since we were all pretty tired and Libby didn't eat well, I gave up the idea. It didn't start for another three hours! We had enough fun for one day already. When the girls are several years older we can come back to Disneyland and see all the night shows. Our friends were done for the day too.

Since we were deep inside the California Adventure park, we had to wander through other areas to exit. The shortest route was through Bugs Land. Such a cute little place! The kids had all kinds of fun just walking through there. We decided to ride 'Heimlich's Chew Chew Train". It is a cute little train ride on the back of a caterpillar who eats and burps his way around the track. Brian called me Heimlich after this. Too funny!

We made our way toward the entrance but before leaving, we stopped to enjoy the fountain and the pretty Christmas tree. We took several pictures together and separately. It was so much fun! We were all very happy that we spent the last part of our day with our good friends.  This was where we parted and went our separate ways to our vehicles. They parked in the Mickey & Friends structure. How did they do that? We were at Disneyland before they were and we couldn't get in there! Someday, I'll have to figure out the trick to getting into the parking structure.

When we boarded the bus (we got the plain white one again), it was after 8pm. The day went so fast! We arrived at 11am, got in the Disneyland gate a little after noon. We put in a long day, but there was just no way we could put in three more hours to see the Fantasmic show. My legs were tired! Gracie had a blister too and Libby wasn't going to make it much longer.

We left the parking lot at 8:30 and Libby was fast asleep at 8:34. I'm surprised she lasted that long! I thought Gracie would sleep too, but she was too busy talking and reflecting on her day. She chattered all the way home. I was glad she did because she kept me awake and alert too. We put in a long day! A long, magical, wonderful day!

Mystery History

October's school project was called "Mystery History". The assignment was to research a historical figure, report and present to the class information learned. The grand finale of this project was a big event at school where each student dresses like the historical figure they chose, and the other students try to guess who it is.

When I read the assignment description to my first grader she didn't get very excited about it until the word "costume" came into play. Apparently, that's the only thing she heard. The kid has selective hearing just like her father.

Once again, choose a person from history and find out all about that person.  "History? Does that mean a long time ago?"  "Yes."  Cue the flailing of the arms, stomping feet and the extra loud whining. "I don't wanna dress up like an old person! I wanna be a princess!" I decided to just let her get it out of her system and I didn't press it further.

She settled down and said, "Mom? Were there any princesses in history?"  "Yes."  She bolted up from her super slouchy position to sitting on the edge of her seat with wide eyes. "Really?" "Yes!" "Was Cinderella a real princess from history?" "No." "Were any Disney princesses real?" "Yes: Pocahontas and Mulan. But there were a lot of real princesses." "Any real princesses in history named Gracie?" "Yes."

Exuberant jumping up and down and happy squeals.  I think we found our historical figure!  "Mom! Let's google her right now!"

I helped guide her through picking out important facts about Grace Kelly that she could use for her presentation. She just needed some talking points, not an essay, but she needed to know about her life and so we read all about her. It was kind of fun.

Gracie made her list of "clues" and I made her costume. Ready!

Gracie chose the dress that I would replicate for her; to my delight she chose the black and white gown from "Rear Window". It's so pretty!  Since my Gracie is a child, I made a few alterations to the design of the neckline. I didn't think she needed a swooping Vneck exposing a lot of bare back, nor did she need to have her dress barely hanging off of her shoulders. Don't get me wrong, I love the dress and it's lovely lines! But, the costume needs to stay on an active six-year old for an entire day.

To finish the costume, we purchased long white gloves from the Halloween aisle at Target, and topped her head with her sister's tiara that she bought at Claires  years ago for prom. Perfect! In the movie, Grace Kelly did not wear a tiara with that dress, but it added to the princess aspect of the character. In total, the entire costume cost around $10.

I omitted the detail work on the hips of the movie star's dress. I desperately wanted to add it, but I ran out of time. The dress looked great without it, and so I just let it go at that. Not a perfect copy, but close enough.

The event at school was great! Organized costumed chaos at its best. There are four classes of approximately 30 kids each. The teachers had all of the kids stand in a large circle and one class plus all of the parents were to mingle around as if they were at a wax museum. The museum subjects stood still (supposedly) and gave the museum guests clues as to who they were. The museum guests then tried to guess who the mystery history figure was. And, on to the next. Every now and then, the teachers would switch the mingling class for a standing class.  But, with all of the mingling, the kids standing still found this a great opportunity to talk amongst themselves as did the parents. Wandering through the crowd, the conversations were all about the kids history characters, so even though it seemed like chaos, the purpose of the event was right on. There were a lot of great historical figures in the room, very cool! In fact, it reminded me of the movie, "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure" when they gathered so many people from  history together.

The teachers: Cleopatra, Albert Einstein, Maria Montessori and Mona Lisa

Historical characters acting as wax figures waiting to give clues to the museum guests.

Educational Chaos

Princess Grace with Princess Diana

Betsy Ross, Princess Grace, and Amelia Earhart

Walt Disney, Shirley Temple and others try to guess Princess Grace's name