Costumes? Already? I blame the internet…

The girly girl has been pondering halloween costumes since Nov 1.  I call it “Extreme Advanced Planning”.

First up, her originating idea – a disco ball.  I blame this website for her idea.  We planned to do it using a beach ball under the paper mache (easier and cheaper to work with than a 3 foot weather balloon), and many mylar balloons for the glitter squares.  She planned to put her ipod inside with a mini speaker.   Oh…. and I was to make disco costumes for her friends.

Um…. O.K……

Well, that all just got thrown out the window!  Her new idea is inspired by this fabric from Equilter:

http://www.equilter.com/cgi-bin/webc.cgi/st_prod.html?p_prodid=111037&sid=31U9Hz2Sc2dk4F1-47110339536.00

She also wants some chalkboard fabric from Nancy’s notions:

http://www.nancysnotions.com/product/fabric/special+use+fabrics/47%22+wide+black+chalkboard+fabric+.do#

She won’t let me say any more, so I’ll let you draw your own conclusions on what she is planning.

Besides, it will probably morph and change in the next 6 months, so she doesn’t want to lock herself in just yet.

One more halloween costume nearly done…sort of… maybe…

So….  I had to make an executive decision – the neon had to go – it wasn’t working as I hoped it had.  Here is a picture before I removed it:

The overskirt simply wouldn’t lay right at all.  If I had wanted an external hoop on a skirt, it might have done the trick, but the wire was just too inflexible.

It looks better without it….

What is very subtle here is the lighting under the planets – they do sort of glow in daylight, but when the lights get turned off:

I actually have two more items to complete for my costume.

I need a black petticoat, as I used one from a long ago costume to take these shots, and it really doesn’t fit anymore (hmmm, maybe that was WHY it was in the daughter’s dress up box!).  I just couldn’t wear it for two nights in it’s current state.

And I need a nice-plain-not-filthy-looking-or-festooned-with-slutty-’pirate’-lace pirate hat.  They don’t exist this year.  Why does every pirate hat either go with the pirate mini dresses, or look like it was dragged through the mud to emulate Jack Sparrow?  I bought black denim and a small piece of ultrasuede for edging, and will make a nice, plain pirate hat from that.  I will use the same method as used last year for the miniature pirate hat, and just enlarge it.

S’s tuxedo needs more gold spray paint, and then someone needs to paint the skull on the back.

Thank goodness I still have a week and a half!

Hmmmm – maybe the neon would make a good hatband.

A preview of things to come

More later when I have time to write….

Progress on my costume

One more piece finished – the underskirt for my costume is done.  It is a 3/4 circle skirt – I simply didn’t have enough of this fabric to do a full circle, and was pushing it as it was.

Note the planetary fabric in the background.  That is the overskirt.

I recognize that they totally don’t match – no worries as the underskirt matches the pirate corset.

Hopefully, it will look like the following in the dark when I use my LED’s and neon:

The neon will go on the outside, and I’m going to sew the LED’s to tulle beneath the planets.  We all agreed that they were a little too bright to endure as an external lighting – they needed something to dull down the shock of them.  Now the skirt becomes a projector of sorts!

We are going to an extraterrestrial pirate ball, after all!

Now the question I have to figure out is if the tulle should be attached to the planets, or if I should keep them separate…

…Did I mention that the neon lines can flash?  I may be responsible for sending someone into seizures…hehehe.  Or, maybe I’ll be nice and just leave them on a normal setting.

Boy, I’m going to need a place to hide all the spare batteries!

And, a parting photo of my studio guest, who prefers to sleep while I sew – Mickey:

Off to do more geometry for this skirt – nothing like trying to remember how to measure ellipses and circles!

One costume down!

Here are the finished efforts for Glitter Glue Princess’s costume.

She is going as a Mummer Pirate, and if you don’t know what a mummer is, look here and here..

The hat is her homage to the lead singer – Joziah – of Gandalf Murphy (she saw it at the store and HAD to have it)….

We found the skull button set at Jo-Ann’s, and she hot glued them to the hat.

The skirt is a clearance item from J.Jill.  It is a cool ragged silk number.  It was the smallest petite skirt I’ve ever seen there, and it is a bit long for her, but works great with the costume.  The ragged bias strips make it move and shimmer when she walks.

The shirt was previously posted, and the corset was just finished.  How do you make a corset for a girl?  You make it comfy, that’s how.  Note the shirring on the sides – looks like a corset, but fits like a comfy tank top…  I think we can use it for at least a couple years.

Now she wants some glittery dorothy shoes to go with her jingle-y red belt!

Bwahahaha – my costume lights arrived

I been formulating my plan on my costume for the Gandalf Murphy Ball next month….

If you need to light something up the quick way, try these little suckers, attached to barrettes.  (I didn’t realize the clip was out of the picture till I uploaded – sorry – see the ones on the cards.)

And in the dark, with the battery on:

And here is the fabric so far:

I’ve got my test muslin cut out.  Now all I can hope for is a bit of peace to get the muslin sewn before I cut into the good stuff.

Halloween plans are starting already

People who know me know that I’m renowned for my halloween costumes – after experiences of sewing formals, I find my daughter a MUCH easier client to sew fancy smancy outfits for. I use patterns from the store as a base, but most every costume has custom drafted parts to it, due to her fitting challenge of being skinny and tall.  Here are a few of our past entries:

Well, this year is the year of the “MAD SCIENTIST” – a lab coat with hair that looks like an explosion, and test tubes to carry.  I’ve found that it isn’t as easy as I thought to find a child sized lab coat.  *sniff* I think this will be the first year she will wear something that isn’t homemade for the halloween parade at school.

In addition to this lovely ensemble, I’m making her and me costumes to wear to the Gandalf Murphy Halloween Ball, in Ann Arbor. (YES!  We’ve talked her into going!  YAY!)  Soooo, I’m making her a pirate costume to wear to that.  Hopefully, if I make the waist large enough, she could wear it next year. She has selected red bandanna skull fabrics with red and black to accessorize.

My costume is in the formulation stage right now, but so far, it will involve LED lights – hehehe – I’m going to freak everyone out .  Here is my first draft in my pattern drafting software.  I’ll leave it to you to figure out what I’m going to be:

More on this later as we get more formulated plans.

Arrgh, or how to dress like a pirate…

So, now for the long awaited pirate garb. This has monopolized my sewing time for the last three weeks and I’m just now coming up for air!

 

Here is my pirate outfit – pardon the dazed look and frazzled hair, it was a long day at work before this was shot:

The chemise is hand drafted and made of pima cotton- not bad for my first try yes? The 8 point skirt is hand dyed after being sewn together, also hand drafted. And the bodice, well, I cheated and bought it off ebay. But….. It is SO cool, man! Look at this thing! Who could turn this down if they were going to a pirate party??? (Besides, I couln’t find the fabric anywhere and I didn’t want a crash course in corsetry!)

Here is S’s outfit:

The vest is a thoroughly modified and adjusted version of the Simplicity Pirates of the Caribbean pattern, but I added fabric to the back, added side slits, drafted a facing to the remove the lining (I made the thing out of stretch satin backed suede, for goodness sakes!) and did a full waist adjustment to give it more ease. There are 15 buttons down the front, but lucky me, the fabric store was selling random metal buttons by the bag for $2! The top is another pattern redraft after my last post on stupid sizing. During the photo session, S complained about the back being too narrow in the top. This will be definitely remade a bit later. I really thinking of hand drafting it too after my success with my outfit and finding some lovely tutorials on the net.

And every pirate needs accessories yes?

The pouch is for me – obviously there is no place to stash anything in my outfit, I drafted the embroidery myself. The nametag was S’s idea – note the obscure Dread Pirate Roberts reference from the Princess Bride. We’d discussed adding “ask me about my multi pillage discount”, but obviously there wasn’t enough room.

Now….. to go finish the facings in a Minnie Mouse shirt and hunt for some missing ears!