Sneak Peek . . .

   . . . Shh! Don't tell!

Brandon and Kaylie are in the cast of Uintah High School's production of The Little Mermaid. Which makes me a "Drama Mama." Which means I was needed to help where I could in the production. Which, for me, meant help in costuming. About a month ago I was asked if I could design fish costumes for "the eight dancers." I said, "Sure," and about a week later I went to a meeting where I was told that the director, Mr. Piner, wanted them to look like fish—not dance costumes.

And this was what I had to start with:

They had already ordered eight of these body-suits; two yellow, two silver, two bright orange, and two blue, but I had to wait a few weeks  for them to come in from China. 

I took on the challenge, started looking at pictures of colorful fishies as inspiration, and while I waited for the suits to come in I started illustrating.

Here's what I came up with:

the blue and green betta

magically photoshopped from white to yellow . . .

 

the crowntail

(which, I suspect, is another variety of betta)

the dragonette

the Rainbow Fish?

Actually, this one is not supposed to be Rainbow Fish. I was copying this totally cool scaled shirt (from the 80's production of The Nutcracker with Baryshnikov):

The coolest part about this shirt is the way it moves when he dances. See it here

But every kid who saw my drawing— every kid: my kids, all the kids at the high school . . .

. . . as soon as they saw it they said, "It looks like Rainbow Fish!" But really it is just the fish with cool scales.

the nudibranch, a sea slug . . . you know,

♪ Each little slug here, cutting a rug here, under da seeeeeea!  ♫

the lionfish

These were all the illustrations I had time to make before the suits and the fabrics were here and I had to start making patterns and sewing. So I still had two costumes to design, and not really any idea what I wanted to do, and I was creating patterns and sewing like mad, putting in eight to twelve-hour days! But one of my dancers showed me this fish that she wanted me to design her costume after, so I kept it in the back of my mind:

a photoshopped Siamese Fighting Fish 

(another type of betta; it used to be solid white)

And another of my dancers was re-cast as a Mer-Sister, so I didn't have to make an eighth costume (thank goodness!)

And that's all you're getting for now—until the play is either finished, or at least well into it's run.

You will have to see The Little Mermaid if you want to see whether my dancers actually look anything like the illustrations. 

And you should see the play in any case. The kids have worked hard and are doing a fantastic job, the sets are amazing, and so are all of the costumes! Tomorrow is opening night . . . It's going to be a lot of fun!