Rodent Family, Astronauts and Project Runway

I made this rodent family for a cute family in Spain.  Neus, the mom, wanted to make sure the rat head on her husband had a chewed up ear.  I just love little details like that.  Whenever I see/think of a raccoon, it makes me sing Rocky Raccoon in my head.   The in-my-head-music-video of that song looks like a Wes Anderson clay-mation with animals.  I always thought Rocky Raccoon was literally meant to be an anthropomorphic raccoon.  I remember talking to Joseph about the song and being surprised that he didn't think the same way. 

We are getting ready for Halloween over here.  This year I actually bought a pattern and am sewing Walter a costume from it.  He's going to be an astronaut.  I have never sewn from a pattern before, except for one thing I made from a Lotta Jansdotter book.  It's so weird.  I am glad I taught myself to sew before trying patterns.  There are so many arrows, dots and triangles involved in the real deal.  Had I learned from patterns initially, I probably would have been too intimidated to try my own thing.  As I am working through this astronaut monstrocity (labeled "easy") I find myself just having to veer off and make bits my own way.  I just can not comprehend certain steps.  The pocket directions might as well have been written in German.  I even spent some time Googling in the hopes that some sweet mom out there posted a tutorial on you tube pertaining to this particular pocket I needed to make.  Man, there are a lot of variations of pockets in the world.  Holy geez.  Oh well, I sewed it on my way, and you can definitely store stuff in it.  Do astronauts really have pockets on their suits?  For moon rock collecting, maybe.  I will tell you that when I bought the pattern, I thought it would come quite easily to me.  I will even tell you that in the back of my mind I imagined this costume launching an interest in fashion design (and, more embarrassing, a spot on next year's Project Runway competition).

Can we talk about Project Runway for a second?  Are you watching it?  I've been upset with this season.  They seem to be upping the drama factor pretty hard.  I never liked those high drama reality shows.  I lived through junior high, I don't want to go there again.  Some of these contestants seemed highly unstable and put on the show solely for the purpose of acting irrationally or immaturely.  It's too silly when it gets like that.  The best "reality" moments are when the designers are generous with one another, or speaking admirably about other contestant's work.  And, the best part of the show overall is seeing how people are creative under pressure.  I feel like Tim Gunn needs to have a stern talking to with some of the decision makers behind the show.   What are your thoughts?