The weeks that were. (Part 3)
On the other hand, it seems James' work has opened an opportunity for me to flex my time management and crafting muscles.
His work holds a dress-up theme every Monday, and he sometimes asks me for advice on what to wear, how to do it, and so on. Last weekend was something of a crash course for him on making props and headgear. they had an Angels Vs. Devils theme, and he was assigned to look for weapons. He was quite set on the devil tridents that sold so well on Halloween. Alas, Toy Kingdom was fresh out of them, since there were no stocks.
Some imagination and resourcefulness was needed, stat.
He had a budget of P4k for the endeavor, but I hoped we could spend below P1k for this, as much as possible. He mentioned this would be a one-time thing, and thus I thought it'd be best if we saved money for "the big one", should it ever arrive.
We first bought some cheap toy axes we could pry apart (cheap being P40). We now had three axe heads and three "spear-heads" that used to be the axe handles. We next bought three-foot long PVC pipes, some sealant glue, and two cans of spray paint, one in Dark Grey, and another in Mettallic Brown.
We went home to start assembling the weapons and do the household chores together. It was fun painting the weapons, and it was funny going back forth from that to the laundry. James urged me to take a break, and we snacked and relaxed outside while the spin cycle rumbled in the house.
The arms given two good coats of dark grey.
The color will serve as a base for the metallic brown later on.
The arms finally given a nice touch of metallic brown.
It was supposed to look mottled and rusty at first, then we decided to go all the way with rusty.
However... it certainly looks more bronze-y now, no?
Later on, we found out that one of his team mates had hoped he could find light-up devil horns in Divisoria or Baclaran like picking apples from a tree. Take note -- this guy went from Baclaran to Divisoria expecting to find something at 7:00pm -- then 8:00pm! I decided we were better off making the headgear for the team, and amazingly, we were.
We spent majority of late Sunday evening and early-to-late Monday morning putting everything together. I remember whining the hardware store didn't have the right materials -- if they did, I'd give those axes a way bigger blade and make them look more menacing. James told me he appreciated the thought, but reminded me this was going to be a one-time, ever-changing dress-up theme - there wasn't enough time to construe something mind-blowing, and I was asking for cosplay convention levels. He was happy enough that I was helping him and supporting him through this project.
James told me the last time he'd dome anything like this was in High School. I simple said "welcome to my world", and kissed him on the cheek. I think the experience is going to leave quite an impression on him.
James later posted this as part of his Facebook status:
... I've proven to myself that if me and my honey put our backs into it there's little we can't do, and there are no regrets with that.
I am pleased to say that the horns were very popular - we made 5, and only 2 made it back home. The three were left with people at work.
The end result of our weekend toil:
I kinda like how the black horns look on him better than the red. What do you think?
Awww what James posted on FB was sweet! Also, how fun are crafting collabs with our significant others? ;-)
ReplyDeleteAw thanks. Meream! It was, it was indeed. :) Beneath the seeming-gruff exterior, he's quite a sweetheart.
ReplyDeletewell... it felt a bit like working with a client, haha! It was fun showing James how to paint, surely. As for the horns, we took some time putting his ideas down on paper (or cardboard, as the case stands, but soon he was gluing and assembling the headgear, as the Internet says, like a boss. And he insisted I sleep when we had to wait for the glue to dry. :)