Witchy-pooh

Five years ago my then 4 year old daughter wanted to be a witch for Halloween.  I excitedly started Pinterest searching witch costumes and was dreaming of a purple and orange tulle masterpiece.  Sadly my daughter had other ideas.... witches wear plain black dresses.  Booooo!!!!

I made her what she wanted, and in the end I was glad because she was the cutest damn witch I'd ever seen.

Fast forward to now and my 4 year old son wanted to be a witch for Halloween.  I asked him what a witch wears and he said a dress, so we headed to the Pinterest search again and he loved the fluffy tulle numbers.  He wanted to be a "rainbow witch".  All my dreams from five years ago had come true!!

My daughter's dress was made using Butterick 4319, with the hat coming from Simplicity 3680 I believe.  All made out of black poplin from memory.

For my son's dress I wanted to use knit as I had a roll of black jersey, and wanted to use a pattern I already had.  I went to the Stitch Upon a Time Girls Shirtzie pattern.  Advice from their Facebook group was to size up because it's a snug fit and boys aren't usually used to that in clothes.  He measured between a size 4 and 6 around with a 4 in height.  But when I compared the finished measurements to one of his (smaller) t-shirts, it was more like a size 10.  In the end I decided to cut a size 4 bodice with a "full bust adjustment", pivot method, to take it out to the size 10 line on both front and back.  I do FBAs for myself all the time, so this seemed like an easy solution.  It kept the smaller shoulders but added girth to cover his round middle.  I then cut the skirt size 10 at the waist, but a 4 length.  It turned out the perfect size, easy to get on and off, but not so loose that it lost it's shape.

For the bodice, I sectioned off the front and redrew the neckline to get the front panel, and then attached rainbow ribbon.

For the skirt, I was using 6" wide tulle off a roll.  I decided that 6" scrunched pretty nicely into about 1" so I did some maths and cut 9 strips of each colour, which I then divided into 3 rainbows around the skirt.  I just bunched up the tulle and pinned it in place all the way around then sewed it down before gathering the skirt into the waistband.

And that's how I made my rainbow witch, using the hat from 5 years ago with tulle added, and a pair of his sister's slightly too small rainbow leggings.  I loved it, and he loved it which is the most important part.