The Annual Event!
The volunteer turnout to our annual workshop always amazes me. We post online about the different costumes we are going to build at the event, and people show up excited and eager to help. Most have a particular costume they want to work on, but many just want to help and learn. For our 2017 Workshop event, we had about 25 volunteers show up at the Kansas City Woodworkers Guild and we planned on building 5 costumes in a single afternoon. NuMotion provided matching wheelchairs for our event so we could build directly onto wheelchairs that were almost identical to the ones used by our amazing kids.
Wheel of Fortune
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Our first costume project was for 4-year-old Macy who requested a “Wheel of Fortune” themed costume. The plans for the costume featured big sections of the famous wheel from the show on the sides of her wheelchair, blinking green and pink lights all over, and the frame of the costume was going to be purple with lots of jewels and bling all over it. Then above Macy was the puzzle being solved on the show. The puzzle was Macy’s favorite nursery rhyme, “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, How I Wonder What You Are.” In the center of the costume, we planned for a spinning wheel right in front of Macy that she could spin it the whole time she goes trick-or-treating. The team of volunteers did an amazing job on Macy's costume and were very fast.
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KU Jayhawk Basketball
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Our second costume was for 4-year-old KU Jayhawk fan, Gaige. The fact that Gaige was also blind, added a new design element to the costume that we hadn’t been exposed to. The whole costume needed to be pleasant to touch and feel and needed to also include sounds to interact with. So, we planned a special KU Basketball themed wheelchair costume for him with a giant plush Jayhawk and a board in front of Gaige that was orange with grooves carved into it that mimicked the black lines of a basketball. We also had some awesome sound effects that were recorded by the KU Basketball staff with some very special messages for Gaige. We were lucky to have a volunteer that was very skilled in electronics and sound effects to help wire the entire costume with these amazing sounds for Gaige. The team was lead by our very own Reese, who is the inspiration behind Walkin' & Rollin' Costumes. And besides the fact he was only 12 years old at the time, he did a great job and the entire team that worked on Gaige's costume did a fantastic job. Gaige and his family could not have been happier with how it turned out.
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Amelia Earhart Plane
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Madi was the recipient of our third costume build at the workshop. This energetic 5-year-old wanted any type of plane, she didn't care what kind of plane. So, for her unique costume, we partnered up with Prairie Fire 4-H club to build this amazing costume for Madi. They came up with the awesome idea of making it an Amelia Earhart plane so Madi could really shine while flying in this costume. The entire team showed up and did a fantastic job building the costume. They had a spinning propeller in the front and made a unique hinge system for the wings so they could fold up when Madi needed to go through doorways. They all worked great together and ended up with a truly unique and amazing costume for Madi.
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Elena of Avalor
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The forth wheelchair costume we worked on was for 9-year-old Cherokee. She loved the Disney television show, "Elena of Avalor" and wanted her costume to be the fancy dress that Elena wore in the show. But we also had to make sure that her dress was safe from the wheels of her wheelchair and also covered her wheelchair to help hide it. So this project was actually made in conjunction with a few volunteers from California. One volunteer was a costume designer in Hollywood, who would be making the dress for Cherokee. The second was a going to build the scepter that Elena held. The final piece of the puzzle was for the volunteers at this workshop to build the frame to go under the dress and keep it protected, as well as any wheel covers and extra princess bling that the costume would need. The team did a fantastic job and once everything was completed, it was all shipped off to Cherokee in time for Halloween.
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Back to the Future DeLorean
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The last costume we were working on was actually to help out one of Walkin' & Rollin' Costumes teams in Houston, Texas. That team had already began production on the "Back to the Future" DeLorean a few weeks before, until Hurricane Harvey hit Houston in the fall of 2017. The team had to evacuate their homes which were a few feet under water so their production on the costume halted. However, they were still eager to help finish the costume for 7-year-old Blake. So in order to help keep them on track, a few of the students from Olathe Northwest High School, who were already on their 2nd costume for other kids, came into the workshop in order to help out Blake. With the help of some additional volunteers at the workshop, they helped the Houston team stay on schedule by building out the frame of the costume and the hovering light effect of the wheels. We were then able to ship this part of the costume down to our Houston team who were able to add this to the parts they already had constructed, stay on track, and deliver the costume to Blake before Halloween. Way to work together as a team no matter what happens. Thank you so much for the extra help on this costume.
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Now I'm sure that many of you would like to see the completed costumes of the 5 we worked on for the 2017 Annual Workshop, so here they are:
Our annual workshop is held in a weekend in September. We always announce it early on our website and social media, so be sure and follow us on Facebook and Twitter and check back on our Events page of our website to see when the next workshop is scheduled. It's a free event that anyone can attend, at any age so be sure and stop by our next workshop. You might be surprised how fun it is.