Purple Dragon Costume

This is my 9 year old Granddaughter Alana. The costume was inspired by one of her favorite video games (Skylanders). She wanted to be a dragon like the ones in the game - we took a few features from different characters and created the Alana version :-) We found fabric that already had a "scale" pattern and painted it with a magenta fabric paint to create texture. The red breast plates are painted faux leather. The mask is paper mache, aluminium foil and hours of painting. The silver horns are silver metallic fabric stuffed with shredded plastic grocery bags (the long tail is also stuffed and formed with shredded plastic grocery bags). Once Alana drew her ideas down, we decided on the color, number of horns and style, it took about 130 hours to complete as every inch of her body is covered, including 3 fingered claws and feet, and we had to create our own patterns for everything so it fits her perfectly. One of her 'dragon powers' is breathing lightening which we accomplished with battery operated tea lights hidden in the nose of the mask.Materials cost $75. Labor costs over $1300-if it wasn't on grandmother (Mammaw)time :-). When wearing the costume Alana NEVER breaks character...it's astounding how authentic she is.