I Wanna be a Rock Star, Part I: the guitar

Tonight is the Halloween party. It's early because next weekend there is a big soccer tournament and the couple hosting it didn't want to do it on Halloween. It is their first year as homeowners and they are looking forward to trick-or-treaters. I can't say I blame them as I love trick-or-treaters as well (not to mention all the left over candy).

I always have a hard time coming up with a costume. A couple of months ago, one of my friends posted a couple of pictures of himself from the early '90s on Facebook. His pictures inspired my costume: I'm going to be a rock star.

Every rock star needs a guitar. I was looking at a stack of boxes in the recycle pile at work one day and mentioned to a co-worker I could probably use one to make a guitar for my costume. He said to tell him what I wanted and he would make one for me. (I have awesome co-workers). So, I found what I was looking for on eBay (of course), printed out a picutre and said that he just needed to cut out the basic shape for me. I was thrilled with what he gave me and found out this morning that he actually had another co-worker bring in his guitar to use as a model. (Some of us just can't limit our Starcrack addictions to weekdays-I ended up right behind the guitar owning co-worker in line for our caffeine fixes this morning. The ensuing conversation is how I found out about the guitar).

Last weekend, I painted the guitar. Last night, my friend came over to help me finish it. Here's the end result:

The white and brown paint is your standard (cheap) tempura kid's craft paint. I went with white so it would show up better in the dark. The brown turned out awesome-close up, it looks like wood. The grey bars and the purple squiggles are acrylic. The purple is actually glittery. The strings are 30-lbs. fishing line held into place with brads. The grey knobs at the top are part of how it was cut out. The strap is a belt from a pair of shorts of mine that I don't use because the dogs chewed one of the ends off of it. The purple knobs are dark chocolate Hershey kisses with the tops cut off. My friend laughed as I was cutting the tops off. "Leave it to you to find a way to include chocolate," was her comment. I rewrapped them after I cut the tops off, so they can also double as a snack should the need arise.

I am very pleased with how this turned out. Not too shabby for a cardboard prop!