My Grandma"Cookie" taught me to sew when I was six, by having me stitch around a paper plate on her Bernina sewing machine. Soon I graduated to making playclothes, then purses, dresses, and my own Halloween costumes.

With help from my friends Gavin and Courtney, who came to visit me in Mayumba in August 2005, and Rich, the WCS Mayumba project director, I made these costumes for the Gabonese Independence Day parade, during which some of Mayumba National Park's environment club kids put on a pageant about marine ecosystems and ecotourism. About 2000 people watched the parade, including all the local and regional authorities.

Three years later, the costumes still serve the project well, being incorporated into school and village visits, and most recently decorating the Mayumba Marine Turtle Expo. In April 2008, I held a costume-making training in Libreville, Gabon, during which I taught educators from 3 different field sites how to make economical and durable leatherback and olive ridley turtle, crab, and jellyfish costumes.