Easiest, Cheapest Costume Ever

“Mom, how do you make lion costumes?” asked my daughter calling me on the day of a gala philanthropic event supporting literacy in which college men compete for a crown by dancing across stage to musical productions they choreograph themselves with a team of girls.
My daughter’s team was competing to tunes from The Lion King.
No need to panic, even though it was the very day of the event. Our family knows how to make the easiest, cheapest, lion costumes ever.
My mind flashed back to my early days of parenting when this same daughter was a twin set with her sister who is only a year older; two little blond darlings with huge, relaxed smiles and easy giggles.
We were living in Louisiana, eating beans and cornbread every night and thankful just to pay our bills.
For Vacation Bible School that year I turned to my rag closet and pulled out an old brown towel to make the costumes they needed for Noah’s Arc day. They skipped into church, holding hands and dressed as a pair of lions without worrying about the fact that, scripturally speaking, one of them should have been a male.
“Guess what, Mom, we won first prize!” was how they greeted me that afternoon, tiny fingers trailing fluttery blue ribbons in the air.
To make two costumes, you’ll need about fifteen minutes and the following:
-one brown or tan towel,
-3 yards of bright ribbon,
-2 plastic hair bands,
-2 safety pins to hold the tail to their pants,
-your glue gun.
Cut the towel in half, lengthways.
Then, to make two tails, cut another four inch strip lengthways off the rough edge of each half. Roll up each four-inch strip to form the tails, but cut off the last three inches to save for making the ears. With your glue gun, run a seam down your rolled tail almost to the end to hold it together. Cut the lose end, fringing to look like a lion’s fuzzy tail.
Cut your ribbon into six equal parts, ½ yard each, then, tie one ribbon around the ends of each tail. Done.
To make the lion’s mane, fringe the remaining towel into strips starting from the rough side and cutting to within two inches of the seemed side. Don’t cut all the way through, just close to the seemed side of the towel.
Glue a piece of ribbon on each end of the seemed side, hang it around the neck of each little lion and tie a big bow. Done.
To make the ears, simply fold the remaining scraps from the tails into squares, then, cut into triangles. Glue two triangles onto each headband. All done.
We laughed as we watched two grown college men dance to “I just can’t wait to be king,” competing with twenty other contestants. But the best part was when both lions made the finals.
We are pretty sure it had something to do with the costumes.
Cathy Primer Krafve, aka Checklist Charlie, lives and writes with a Texas twang. Comments are welcome at http://checklistcharlis.blogspot.com or cathykrafve.gmail.com.