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.

A journey in Journey Girls

My daughter got a Journey Girl doll for Christmas a year ago. I was very excited at the prospect of making lots of dolls clothes for her.  Years ago I'd bought my niece a doll and made it some clothes, but hadn't realised at the time that the doll was 16" and the patterns were 18". So now all these patterns that had been useless were finally useful!!

Sadly life is never that simple.

Commercial patterns, and most indie PDFs I've come across, draft for an American Girl doll, which is a different shape to Journey Girls. There are several websites/blogs comparing measurements so I wont go into details but essentially the American Girl dolls are wider through the body so all the clothes end up too big.

Before I realised this, I downloaded this free pattern for an Elsa inspired dress and made it up without fitting. I thought a mock-up wouldn't be necessary for a commercially available doll. I've learnt that lesson the hard way!  Luckily my then 6 year old thought it was amazing.

Following this, an internet search for patterns specifically designed for Journey Girls brought me to Pixie Faire, who offer (among other things) a free t-shirt pattern by Liberty Jane Clothing.  I also got a leggings pattern from Artsy Fartsy Mama; then found a glove pattern from Diane Morello on Pinterest; and boots from Peek-a-Boo Pattern Shop (which should fit but I used the wrong seam allowance so they are a little big)
Which gave me Batgirl!!

DC Super Hero High inspired Batgirl

For the mask I just googled 'bat mask template' and printed one in a smaller scale to fit, then cut it out of felt.

That t-shirt pattern from Pixie Faire came in handy again recently.  After Christmas just gone, my daughter "needed" an Emma Wiggle skirt and I decided to make a matching outfit for the doll from left overs.  The skirt is just a circle skirt with 'waist' measurement being about 1" larger than her hips and then sewn onto elastic.

(Yes that is a different doll, that is MY doll that I got last year so I can make costumes for it!)

Over the year, I haven't done as much doll sewing as I'd hoped for, because of the effort in trying to mock up a pattern and make it fit, especially when sleeves were involved.

Then, the other week, Craftsy had their free weekend and I watched this How to Make Dolls Clothes video/class by Joan Hinds.  In the video she shows you how to quickly and easily make a sloper for your doll, and then compare it to existing patterns to see where/if you need adjustments.  This has given me a new lease of life on my doll sewing and I have recently sewn up two more garments, which I will blog about shortly.  Stay tuned!

Welcome to Space

I've done a little bit of sewing since the new year, but first I wanted to talk to you about my Space Dress.

I had started working on pattern New Look 6299, doing a full bust adjustment, changing sleeves etc to make a dress in the winter.  Upon completing my first muslin, I discovered just how flattering I thought it was and how great it made me feel.  This dress is still not made as I haven't nutted out all the fitting issues, and it has now been put aside as it's very much a winter dress.

My daughter's birthday was in September and we go all out for parties.  This year was a space theme and we were all getting costumes.  I had decided I wanted a retro-futuristic space outfit, sort of along the lines of "The Jetsons".  I decided to use my New Look 6299 as the base.

First I redrafted it with zero ease in the bust, I was using a PVC fabric with a slight stretch and I like the bust area to be firm.  Then I made a new muslin and drew lines on it to make it 'strapless' shape.  I transferred these lines to the pattern and voila! I had a space dress pattern.  All I had to do to complete my desired look was cut a hi-lo hem and add rectangles for straps.  I also made a bolero top to go over it, but I can't recall which pattern that was now.

This dress has now become a bit of a starting base for things I've made since.

A Labyrinth of Masks

Last weekend we went to a friend's masked birthday party.  My husband, being the creative type he is, said to buy some plain masks and he'd decorate them.  So, inspired by the Labyrinth movie, that is what he did....

I saw a character in the movie that had little antlers and decided that's what I wanted, so that's what hubby made me ('cause that's the sort of guy he is!).  My mask was painted white, then detailed with gold glitter and more white paint, plus the antlers and feathers on top.

My husband's mask was paint several colours over the top of each other, the details added with gold beading wire, braid left over from one of my old costumes and feathers.

And I'm rather impressed to say that other than the actual base masks which I bought especially, everything else came out of my sewing/craft room (oh, except a few things which I think came out of the garage.... I'm not sure what's holding those antlers up!).

Costume Parade

A few things recently have made me think about my costumes.

The first was a post from Margaret about some of her costumes, and she made mention of a group project we did.  Then Barbara Brackman was talking about the floral dresses that Abraham Lincoln's wife used to wear.  Most recently I made mention of my 'bubble dress' the other day.

I decided to put some of the 'bigger' ones on a page so you can all see them.  So now, just under the header on my blog, you should see a link to the Costume page (if you haven't discovered it already).  All of the costumes featured there link to pages with more information or extra photos.  Some of the information is old/out of date, but I figured I'd put it up like it was.  I used to have it on a webpage so the information has been typed up for ages.  Maybe one day I'll get around to updating it, and my hubby said we should be able to fix up some of the photos a bit with photoshop too.

I've made lots of other costumes that I didn't bother documenting that way, but here are photos of some of my favourites:

'Danielle' from the movie Ever After

I think this was one of the first really involved costumes that I did.  I wanted that movie so many times while I was making it that it was years before I could watch it again.  I wanted to get as many details as close as possible.  Unfortunately my fabric selection was limited to what I could find at the local fabric store so the colours aren't really the most accurate

Made for a Victorian picnic

This was an early piece as well.  Wouldn't like to show anyone the inside because there's a few things which aren't finished off properly ;)

'Miss Congeniality'

Again a movie costume... except this one doesn't appear in the movie at all, only on the cover art.

Manic Surgeon and Naughty Nurse

I love those shoes!! (and my legs at the time, but they don't look like that any more)

So go see the Costume Page, and discover what fills the wardrobe in my sewing room!

I should do more costuming... I haven't done anything 'serious' for years.