Details Really Bring Your Costume to, Err…Unlife

(Bear with me, this is my first time using BlogSpot and any crashing of the internet is unintentional.)

Where to begin? Well, what's a bride without her bouquet?

Being eager to contribute, I leapt at the opportunity to acquire a bouquet for our bloody bride. In my excitement, I forgot to take pictures of the supplies, but picture a bundle of tightly budded roses, some sprigs of baby's breath and some ferns lovingly selected from the supermarket. Then deliberately left in an all-black car, parked in the sun for a few hours while I helped Bev fold tulle. Followed by being shoved in a bag, transported to the craft room, separated, shoved back in a bag when I realized that I forgot most of the stuff I needed for arranging and drying them, rushed home in rush hour traffic, thrown on a coffee table and then chewed on by cats while I napped for 11 hours. I call this technique "strategic abuse". It simulates the effect that wilting flowers would experience when being handled by hungry zombies.
After waking up from my nap, I sorta-delicately teased each of the 16 roses open and filled them with rice to keep them open and help with the drying process. Once all were opened and full, I arranged with baby's breath, fern and eucalyptus sprigs, then tied them together with butchers' twine, cut the stems and popped them in the oven to dry. There are several methods for drying flowers, ranging from hanging them for a few weeks to covering them in cat litter and microwaving them, but I found sticking them in the oven for a few hours at 100 degrees Fahrenheit gave the most natural drying appearance and fit our deadline.  
Before going in the oven:

After the oven:

 

 

As you can see from our previous posts, we had a lot of props. Groom-bits, bouquets, cattle prods.... It's a literal lot to handle. Originally the part of the groom with the ring was supposed to for our bride, Megan, to carry, but with the bouquet, she wouldn't have a hand free for any of the con stuff. And trust me, you'll want a hand free to do con stuff. Luckily our zombie-wrangler extraordinaire was able to use the extra groom piece as bait to coral us zombies. It filled in for the brain that she forgot to bring.
To keep her hands from being completely full, she hooked the prod on a carbineer clip and added it to her belt.
Beth, who had the original bride's maid dress that our dresses were fashioned out of, also had a matching bag for her purse and Bev used her built-in storage.
I'm an excitable and not-very-good-at-keeping-track-of-things person, so I hit up thrift stores the day before to find a little wallet/clutch purse that I could clip into my part of the groom:

I clipped it onto the shoe laces and it stayed put all day. It was easily removable, so I didn't have to carry the gory stump to dinner. It allowed me to have my money, phone and meds on hand, but left my "assistant" free to go wander the con.

That's what I call concealed carry. The business cards even fit in the hem, making them easily accessible.

When it comes to details, though, Beth is the master.

She not only painted her teeth, but had a bunch of hair accessories that dangled like any disheveled 'do ought to.
She also brought stick on nails for us bridesmaids and came up with the brilliant idea of leaving a few off and covering the bare nails with bits of cotton and tons of fake blood to look as if the nails had been torn off in the pursuit of brains.

Yet another thing I forgot to get a good picture of, but that's half a fake nail on my index finger, some cotton ball and a ton of blood. Extremely gorey and often the first thing people noticed when I was perusing comics in the exhibit hall. Just be sure it's all dry before touching vendor's products. Tip: you can wipe excess blood off on your dress.
Beth also stayed in character the entire time, proving that she is the ultimate badass.
For my part, I tried to add realistic details like a trailing shawl and wearing one highheel. Because what zombie manages to keep both her shoes on?

Yep. One shoe and no fucks given.


Lessons from Our First Venture:

• You really have to commit. Because you're going to be walking out in your bloody wedding best right when the Baptist megachurch across the street is letting out of their Easter service and 150-200 church goers are going to notice after your instigator boyfriend yells, "He is risen! And hungry!" So check that anxiety about receiving strange looks and attention.
• Hot glue works best for lightweight, dry materials. Before our next outing I'll be purchasing a staple gun and stapling the pants to the shoe so the hem hides the staples. Towards the end of the day the poor groom's stuffing was hanging out. Also, gluing the towel while it was still wet didn't work very well.
• Business cards are the best investment. People keep catching up with us, we're making new friends, offered new opportunities and sharing all sorts of pictures because we had something tangible for people with our contact info.
• Pay attention to what aspects you want to show off. Remember to take pictures of them in action and to document the process.

See ya'll next time (unless I get expelled from the guild for spilling all of our oops-turned-awesome secrets)!