mini witch

witch with wand
Originally uploaded by O'Chica

Pattern; Little Witch Finger Puppet, Free Crochet Pattern fro Lion Brand Yarn (Pattern Number; 80770AD)
Yarn; KnitPicks Palette, Black and Mint
Hook; US D/3 -3.25mm aluminum

My Halloween Project.

It looks Halloween has got a pretty good position in marketing calender in Japan. There's a whole orange and black section in every 100-yen shop (what there are looks exactly the same thing you'll find in Dollar shop in the US. - they all come from China anyway). Pumpkins on windows of cafes, doctor's offices, grocery stores and beauty salons. There's only one thing I miss - costume. You can't find cheap Indiana Jones' jacket. No Spiderman outfit. No Pirates of Caribbean beads-dangling-wig. No angel, no skeleton.
There are some cat tail clips and witches' hat hair bands, but no "real garments."

When my daughter told me "I am going to be an angel on Halloween Day!", it meant I had to make up some costume for her. Her last year's angel costume was just the right size for her. No hope she'll fit in it even just one arm. Maybe skirt part... if I sew in an elastic at waist.... I thought and thought, and came up with an idea to use my blouse (white, soft, shiny) and little sewing. I let her try on my blouse, but she didn't want to, finally declaiming "I don't want a costume."
WHAT?! What have I done to her? Did she just slip her tongue? Is it just a 4-yr-old's mood swing/ attention span? Or as she lost some of her "American-ness" ?

She can't go trick-or-treating on neighbors anyway (Halloween is not accepted in Japan to THAT level) .
There are other holiday events in Japan she would never see if we stayed in America, we can't have both Japanese and American events, whichever country we were. If we get something new, we lose something what we had. That's the way everything goes. You can't have them all. If you can choose what to have, you are lucky.

Maybe it's not a Japanese/American culture thing for her. She just didn't want to try what doesn't fit on her in the middle of her "camp out" (in our living room), just that. Maybe she demands to have it on Halloween Day, and I'll need to ust a lot of safety pins to fix it in a hurry.

Still, I feel sad (overly sad, I guess) for her that she has lost some of what she was born into.

This little witch does have a magic power to make me feel better. Her name is Hermione. (Yeah, easy. Or we can't remember all the names of the dolls we have.)