In the far corner of the art room, a pile of white and blue plastic piping lays in a haphazardous heap. Six students fiddle with the miscellaneous material, talking as they fit the pipes in different directions trying to create the perfect shape. Although currently hard to imagine, that out of place jumble will soon transform into a pumpkin structure designed to fit perfectly around a young girl’s wheelchair and will make her Halloween extra special.
“Halloween has always been my favorite holiday,” sophomore Emma Jahn said. “I also had knee surgery over the summer, so I know what it is like to be in a wheelchair. I would hate to be prevented from doing something really spectacular for Halloween by a wheelchair.”
Jahn and other students are making a halloween costume for nine year old Faith and her wheelchair, sophomore Miranda Jaramillo said.
“It is important that she thinks she is great exactly the way she is,” Jaramillo said.
Faith is going to be showing off her Nightmare Before Christmas inspired pumpkin costume during her school Halloween parade, Jaramillo said.
Just for Faith to be able to dress up and experience Halloween in such a positive way makes the costume worth the hard work, freshman Amelie Tristram said.
“I hope she [Faith] is truly inspired and supported by this,” Jahn said.
Jahn is one of the several students who is working on creating the costume through the program Magic Wheelchair, she said.
Magic Wheelchair is a nonprofit organization that builds wheelchair costumes for children between the ages five and 17 with no expense to their families, according to Magic Wheelchair’s website. The organization partners the children, who submit a two minute pitch, with a volunteer group, which then makes the costume.
This year students have the opportunity to participate in creating a wheelchair costume through the program, said art teacher and costume construction overseer Gillian Bailey.
Magic Wheelchair was originally founded in order to bring awareness to a form of muscular dystrophy called spinal muscular atrophy. The costumes are created in the hope that they will inspire conversations between other children and their parents during trick-or-treating, according to Magic Wheelchair’s website.
“It is important for people to know a wheelchair is not just capable of being a great costume, but is something that helps people move,” Jaramillo said. “It helps free people.”
Spinal muscular atrophy is a genetic disease that affects the part of the nervous system that controls voluntary muscle movement. Symptoms become apparent when motor skill is affected and can be, according to The Muscular Dystrophy Association website.
It is difficult to be in a wheelchair because you cannot get up or reach places; you cannot even pick things up off of the floor, Jahn said.
The founder of Magic Wheelchair, Ryan Weimer’s eldest son, Keaton, was diagnosed with Spinal Muscular Atrophy when he was nine months old, and the idea to create wheelchair costumes started when Keaton was five and got his first wheelchair, according to Magic Wheelchair’s website.
A couple of weeks ago, Bailey went to Faith’s house to determine what Faith wanted out of the costume and to take measurements of her wheelchair, Jaramillo said.
The group meets during tutorial and is starting to create the base of the structure, Bailey said.
“We are just in the beginning stages of the project,” Bailey said.
Already the group is facing challenges based on the compatibility of the costume and the wheelchair including a wheel clearance to ensure the wheels do not get stuck and stall, Jahn said. They are also experimenting with how to get the costume to look as realistic as possible, she said.
“To get something that is really clearly not a pumpkin, a giant mass of foam and pvc pipe to look like a pumpkin is really hard,” Jahn said.
The group, however, is extremely excited to see Faith’s reaction to the costume and hopes she will enjoy it, Jaramillo said.
“We can make something that is really awesome because of the wheelchair, not despite of it,” Jaramillo said.
