Goblins, Ghouls and Ghosts Oh My! Costumes and and the History of Guising

Hello All and Welcome back to The Daily Maker.
So it's that time of year again when ghosts and goblins abound. I'm talking of course of Halloween our lovely tradition of dressing up in the spookiest and scariest things and going door to door for candy. So this year I wanted to redo a costume from last year now that I have another years worth of Crafty education under my belt. I am attempting round two of being a Plague Doctor. My daughter thank heavens is content with her owl costume from last year as a purple rainbow owl and my Husband has plenty to choose from himself.

  
    This was last year and I wasn't too thrilled with how my costume came out. The coat turned out awesome for being a mash up of two old coat patterns I had lying around. My mask however left something to be desired. So after some research and a pop up from Etsy regarding a shop with leather patterns when I was looking into how to make boots... I found the shop DieselPunk. The guy has awesome leather patterns and he sells them for really reasonable prices too. I've included his link below.

https://www.etsy.com/shop/DieselpunkRo

    Anyway, his patterns are suited to a standard printer and require some assembly with scissors and tape but the results I believe at least speak for themselves.

 

After getting everything cut out and all the holes punched assembly was extremely easy

just a bit time consuming. The whole process was very straight forward. The only thing I had to imagine was the stiffener for the brim. I used thin wire mesh, after stitching it together I made the hatband with a bunch of mini bottles I picked up at Michaels.

Yeah I'm being weird, but hey I honestly can say I love my hat. Seriously, I wear it constantly, look for me around town in Westminster with it. My mask turned out awesome too.

 

I didn't exactly follow the pattern provided because I wanted to put my own twist on things

but I like how it turned out much better than my first attempt. I also made some potion bottles and a pouch to complete the look, with the use of my old coat I figured I could pull off the look pretty well.

 Yes the pouch is rainbow.

Anyway I love everything about Halloween, it really is the most creative Holiday of the year when people go out of their way to be something different for a day or two or four....
However Halloween used to be something very different and the traditions that we follow for it come from quite the colorful background.

Let me take you back to a simpler time when beliefs were very different then those of today.

Halloween’s origins date back to the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain (pronounced sah-wen). The Celts, who lived 2,000 years ago, mostly in the area that is now Scotland, Ireland, the United Kingdom and northern France,though there were many Germanic Celts as well.

   During this time of year Samhain was celebrated as the death of the old year, when the God who governed the sun and light died and left his Widow to mourn for him until his rebirth in the spring. It was also one of the two times of year when the veil between worlds was thinnest allowing for Sidh (pronounced shee) what we know as Fairies and spirits of the dead to visit the living. Many Celts thought that to appease the Sidh and Spirits they should offer food and hospitality. 

 They threw feasts and parties in honor of those past.

Children and teens to honor the dead would dress in the clothes of their dead ancestors (ie great grand parents and other dead relatives) and go door to door reciting verses and asking for food scraps to burn in offering. Setting were placed at family meals in household to welcome those who had passed.

Turnips not pumpkins were carved and placed outside the doors to ward off the mischievous Sidh who liked to play pranks or were sometimes down right mean. The cattle were pulled in from the fields and ritually blessed and cleansed to survive the winter. 

So all in all a very different time and belief system than what we know today. Anyway I hope everyone has something spooky to wear.

Happy Halloween Ya'll.

Regards

Andi from Chaos Creationz