The worst part of making something with your own two hands is that it can be destroyed.
I’m a cosplayer, and I usually make my own costumes (I only have a few, but the future might bring me more 
).
For the past year, I had a costume sitting in my room of my Persona (and occasional fursona) Splatter.
Splatter was originally my TADC oc, but now I use him for other things, too.
It included almost all handmade accessories!
- An 8 foot tail covered in brushed out yarn (free-handed, so no pattern.)
- A pair of clawed gloves with brushed out yarn (recently posted a tester call. Will post another soon.)
- A headband that had one full horn, one broken horn, and two mismatched ears (which I have modded since then.)
- A beautiful crocheted sweater that I still wear (you can see pictures if you search my post history. The city fest one might have a picture)
And some items I bought in stores, including a dress shirt, an old tie, plantigrade feet paws (grrrr, Spirit Halloween didn’t have digigrade), an old leather belt (which I have sadly broken because I once put it up to high so it would reach my very short vest that I had made /whoops\ and then bender over, causing it to snap on all the excess force. It was also just 50+ years old, so it was due to happen) and a pair of torn jeans.
(I would bullet these but I need to highlight the craft stuff.)
Then, one fateful evening (a few months ago) I had been saving my money to buy something. I didn’t know what it was going to be yet, and then it hit me. I’ll update my costume!
So I went to Fabricland (Canadian-owned, great place, good quality, scary prices unless you have a membership and I do
) and bought 2x1 meters of foam, 2x1 meters of faux fur fabric (would never buy a product that an animal was harmed in the making of unless it’s food) and then popped into dollarama to buy two things of superglue (smelled horrible, could NOT breathe when I opened it) and 100 glue sticks.
I came home, selected an old pair of running shoes off the shoe rack (they were my old, bartered shoes and I was worried they would be trashed, so I needed a way to hide them) and got to work.
The idea was to create two digigrade feet paws so I could really look like the version of Splatter I had made the costume of.
I made two beautiful, glorious feetpaws that glittered with shiny red fur!
I was so proud of myself! I kept watch of many convention web pages in my city, excited to wear my hard work to a convention.
Then, my moment came.
A local mall had been hosting a small market for small businesses, and I was determined to go!
(My sister also told me there’d be furries there, but when I went there were NO FURRIES WHATSOEVER)
I went, and found few cosplayers (and NO FURRIES AT ALL), bought four TADC stickers, took some pictures with cosplayers (saw someone with a very good Jax cosplay, three cheers to them), chatted with a lot of TADC fans and walked my feet off.
When I was ready to leave, I went to nearby bus stop and awaited the bus :)
I had checked the weather app that morning, and there was no warning of rain, or even clouds!
Then, a few minutes before the bus arrived, IT BEGAN TO RAIN.
I went on an entire adventure of bus rides, trying to avoid as much rain as I could, and got off my last bus at my sister’s work, THE LIBRARY!
I went inside to pick up a book, and apologized to the staff about the mess of water and mud I brought inside (they were nice enough to not get angry, or scold me. Thank you, librarians!) I picked up my book and walked home in the horrible rain (I usually like rain, but not when I’m in cosplay! I should’ve expected, though. My city’s been experiencing crazy rain since spring, and some of my friends on here will KNOW what I’m talking about.)
By the time I got home, I had been soaked. I entered through the garage so I could dry my costume, and then I found something horrible!
My beautiful new feetpaws… HAD BEEN DESTROYED BY THE RAIN!
They were torn, sopping, muddy, and peeled.
I cried for hours that day.
I threw all but the shoes out, and mourned my paws for days.
And recently, I found what I thought was a solution!
I spent days, days and days, working. Day after day (TADC fans hi, also it was just a week), job after job, working to afford handmade paws from Etsy.
Today I got the money I thought I needed.
The paws I wanted I had thought came with the pants, and I also thought that the price that was on the page was $120.
HOW HORRIBLY WRONG I WAS.
Turns out, that $120 was just the freaking handpaws! The real thing was $300 something! PLUS FREAKING TAX! AND THIS WAS THE SALES PRICE! THE REAL THING WAS $1,500!!!
I was devastated.
But then I found another pair of paws n’ pants.
One actually true to the price.
A $160 pair of paws n’ pants that was in MY SIZE, and within MY BUDGET, and was 75% off from the real price.
I’m buying them.
I just need to talk to someone.
that was a VEEEEERY long post, I’m so sorry guys
What are your unfortunate tales (or tails, if you’re like me)?
Your legends of great sorrow! Your stories of immense sadness!
Now I am going to talk to that someone.
See you all later! Can’t wait to see the stories!
Sorry for the long post!
See you:)
