The Busy Mama's Costume Shop

Candy corn costume

October 2008: May is my fashion-conscious daughter. She doesn't go in for elaborate disguises. Last year she wanted to be candy corn, even though, she hastened to remind me, she doesn't like to eat candy corn (too sweet for her taste).

I made a simple top out of white, yellow, and orange broadcloth. I gathered each layer and stitched it to the next color. To shirr the top, I hemmed the edge and stitched several parallel rows on the sewing machine with elastic thread on the bobbin. The top thread was a variegated yellow/gold/orange thread. I stitched grosgrain ribbon to the top for straps and threaded white, yellow, and orange beads onto the ribbon for trim. She wore beads in her hair as well.

With a white long-sleeved tee and black pants, she was warm, stylish, and seasonally appropriate.

Piplup costume

Hooded sweatshirts are a good costume base for cartoon characters as well as animals. In 2008 Ella was Piplup from Pokémon. For this costume, I picked up a light-blue fleece jacket and made a face and neck feathers/cape out of felt.

I like to use felt for complex constructions in costumes, toys, and doll clothes. I draw my design on a large piece of paper and cut out individual features that will be made of different colored felt. In this case, a medium blue felt forms the background and the light blue, white, yellow, and black are layered over it. I use fusible web to bond the pieces together.

The felt pieces can be basted or sewn to the garment. In this case, Ella thought she might want to wear the costume again, so I attached the face and cape with squares of Velcro. That way the felt could be removed when the jacket was washed. (Eventually, the Velcro fell off, and Ella wears the jacket now without decoration.)

Easy panda costumes

Hooded sweatshirts are a terrific base for many kinds of costumes, especially animal costumes. I like them because (1) they are inexpensive, especially if you buy them at a thrift shop, (2) they keep children warm while trick-or-treating on chilly nights, and (3) they can be reworn, with or without the decorations still attached.

Another nice thing about hooded sweatshirts is that you can spend your precious time doing creative decorating -- adding ears, tails, wings, or faces -- rather than sewing a garment from scratch.

 In 2002, when Bess was 7 and Ella was 2, they decided to be pandas for Halloween. I found two black zippered sweatshirts on sale in the boys department at Sears. I used some white fleece  I had on hand to make ears and a white panel across the body. (Pandas have black ears on a white head, so this isn't literally accurate, but it gives contrasting colors without having to remake the hood.) They wore black pants and gloves. I could have drawn black circles around their eyes, but they didn't want to do it.

After they were through trick-or-treating, I took the white panels off the jackets, but the girls wanted to keep the ears. Ella now wears Bess's jacket; the smaller jacket has been passed on to a niece or nephew. We talked about recycling the black jacket so Ella could be a puppy this year, but I think she is going in a different direction.