Halloween

DIY Infant Stitch Costume in Less than 1 Hour!

| Heather

I love Halloween, like love it. You get to play dress up and people give you free candy. Does it get any better than that?!?!

This was Jackson’s first Halloween. When we were having the serious conversation that was the costume brainstorm we talked about how Kyrie was Boo from Monster’s Inc. dressed as a monster for her first Halloween. Logic dictated that Jackson should also be a monster, but “just a little one!”

Jackson as Stitch, so cute I could just die. 

Kyrie was Lilo, obviously, but more on that another time. This Stitch costume took about an hour and you could do the whole thing without sewing if you wanted to!!

Materials:

  • Hooded footie pajamas (I went on Amazon and found some that were the perfect color)
  • Blue and light purple craft felt (the blue should match the jammies)
  • Light blue polar fleece
  • Thread
  • Hot glue
  • Velcro

How to:

1. I started by making a pattern for the ears. 



2. Then I traced and cut out two on the blue felt and two on the light purple. I trimmed the light purple slightly smaller than the blue. 



3. Stitch has little notches in his ears, so I cut those out. 



4. Next I ironed the ears in half lengthwise and hot glued the blue and purple pieces together. 

5. Next for the tummy. I folded the light blue fleeces in quarters, measured, traced and cut out my tummy shape. 



6. At this point you could just hot glue on some Velcro and call it good. I decided to sew one side on and Velcro the other. However I wanted it to appear like the entire tummy was sewn. So I marked halfway and sewed just the left side of the fleece from pin to pin. 



7. Next I pinned the right side of the tummy piece to the jammies and sewed them together. Don’t forget to unzip the jammies and don’t sew across said zipper.



8. Next I hot glued the Velcro on the unattached side of the tummy piece and lined it up on the jammies. Again, attaching it with hot glue. 



 9. Finally, try the costume on your little one to determine ear location and attach ears. I used hot glue for this final step. 

Aww, such an adorable little Stitch!

-h





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Monster’s Inc. Boo Halloween Costume – Part III

| Heather

The long-awaited and much-anticipated final post on Kyrie’s Halloween costume is in!! I know, pins and needles, right?

Teeth, check.
Hood, check.
Now onto the body!

Ok, so I really had to think through the design and construction of this costume. One sleepless night, and I had a plan! It would have been easier if I didn’t want to finish the inside, but I want Kyrie to be comfortable so it just took a little extra brain power to get it right. One thing to note, you don’t actually need three pieces for the body, I was going to put a zipper in the back and after I cut out my pieces I remembered that the hood is attached to the back, so the closure will need to be at the side-seams. Typical me. Oh-well, live and learn. 🙂

Back:
So, I started by just closing that center back seam. You can baste the batting and exterior (purple) fabric together. Then, right purple sides together, sew, trim, press. Then separately (because I want a finished interior) sew the right sides of the exterior (gray) fabric together.

Then right side purple to right side gray, sew one side seam starting 1/2″ from the top (don’t forget the arm hole). This seam will be a finished edge with Velcro to attached the front to the back. Trim, clip curves, turn out and top stitch. Leave the other side unfinished at this point.

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Front:
Next, I did the Velcro edge of the front of the costume. Same process. Baste batting to purple fabric. Right sides of purple to right side of gray sew one side seam (the one that meets up with the back of the costume). Again, make sure to do the arm hole. I added an extra half-inch to the “depth” location of the arm hole to allow for the overlap of the Velcro. It’s kinda hard to explain, hopefully this picture helps. Trim, clip curves.

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Now for the top edge of the front of the costume. Don’t forget to insert the teeth between the gray and purple fabric. Then then sew along the top edge of the costume, ending about ¾ of an inch from the unfinished side. Trim, Press. Turn out and top stitch both side and top seams. Next top stitch a channel (3/4”)  into the top front of the costume for another piece of boning. Slip the boning in.

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Next, I connected the front of the costume to the back. This is just a little tricky with finishing and the arm holes. Baste purple fabric to the batting. Purple side to purple side, stitch the side seam before and after the arm holes. Do the same with just the gray fabric. You will now have finished edges other than the arm holes. You can press the seam allowance on the arm holes, clipping curves, and then top stitch the purple to the gray giving you a finished arm hole.

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Next, I top stitched four rows into the body of the costume. I just took the length and divided out four equal sections (taking into account the seam allowance for the bottom). I measured carefully and marked my lines with pins and stitched.

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At this point I sewed on the Velcro to the front and back Velcro edges. Be sure to do the back side of one and front side of the other. I did the back-side of the front and the front-side of the back. Now how’s that for a sentence. 🙂

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Almost finished!! Next attach the  bottom. First baste together your layers. I just did purple, one layer of batting, and then gray. This is one seam I didn’t worry about finishing on the inside, it’s just too difficult to get to by hand, and really doesn’t matter. So right side of the costume to right side of the bottom piece, stitch.

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This can be a little difficult because you are sewing a circle to a rectangle, but take your time, it is possible. Remember that the Velcro edges will need to overlap as well. Trim edge, clip curves, and turn out.

Confession: I ended up sewing this piece and ripping it out four times. Yes, four. It seems like when I’m almost done with a project, I do something to make life more difficult. First time, the piece was a little too big. Second time, still too big. Third time, I sewed wrong side to right side. Fourth time – success! Seriously, it doesn’t matter the project, something always gets me. 🙂 My message to you, measure carefully!

Anyway, exciting, it’s really starting to look like a little Boo monster, almost done!!

Monster's Inc Boo Halloween Costume

Next, I attached the hood to the back of the costume. Sew right sides of the purple side only together, you want to leave the gray out so that you can hand finish that edge. Trim and press the seam. Wait to finish the interior.

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Now we need the finishing touches. Boo’s monster has googly eyes and mop like hair. Styrofoam balls, pipe stem cleaners, floral wire, and some cording accomplished that. The Styrofoam balls I picked were too big, like really too big, so I had to go back and buy smaller, lighter ones.

Finally, hand tack the hood lining along the center back seam and hand sew the seam between the of the hood and the gray back lining.

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Voila, we have a sweet little Boo! It’s far from perfect, but it was sewed with love (and actual blood and tears – see Part II).

Happy Halloween! In case you missed them, here are Part I and Part II.

–h

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Nailed it! Monster’s Inc. Boo Halloween Cotume — Part II

| Heather

Ok, so I have to thank my brother-in-law for this blog title and no, I’m NOT trying to brag.

So… I was working hard to finish the Boo costume in time for Halloween when tragedy struck! I went to sit in the folding chair I had next to my work table, sorta missed it, it folded, and I fell through it pinching my upper arm and ripping off my entire ring-finger nail (like down to underneath the skin).

Yah, gross.

1 quick trip to the ER to “fix” my nail and back to work. That’s what we call sacrifice and commitment to a project, right?? And, like my bro-in-law said, I am “nailing” this costume!! Seriously, I think these things only happen to me.

Ready to start sewing? Cutting out is my least favorite part of a project, so that’s done. Yay!!

Teeth:
Yes, oddly, I did the teeth first because they will be sewn into the body and the hood. So I just drew myself a simple pattern and cut 20 or so teeth pieces out of some white canvas I had lying around (you could use any white fabric that has some stiffness to it – you don’t want your monster teeth to be wimpy). Right sides together, sew the top and sides. Clip curves, turn out, press. I then top stitched each tooth to finish them off.

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Hood:
Next, I worked on the hood. I added just one thickness of batting to the hood. Layer purple fabric and batting together (baste if you would like) and sew right sides together down the center back. Trim, clip curves, press.

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Then separately, sew the right sides of the gray fabric together down the center back. Trim, clip curves, press.

Then place right sides together of the purple and gray adding the teeth in between (you could baste the teeth to the gray fabric ahead of time) and sew together. Trim, press the teeth down.

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Top stitch along the front edge of the hood. Then, about 3/4 inch from the edge of the top of the hood, top stitch across the face of the hood a channel where you can insert boning to give the hood structure. Slip boning in.

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Set aside. Finishing the hood will be the final step.

Note: In order to get the teeth to stay down like I wanted, I put binding clips on the hood to reinforce good behavior. 🙂

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We’ll finish Boo in Part III. Until then, happy creating!

–h

Halloween: Boo from Monster’s Inc. — Part I

| Heather

Taking a break from the upholstery project to talk about Kyrie’s first Halloween costume! So so so excited!!

One of my favorite holidays has always been Halloween because I’ve always LOVED playing dress-up. What made it extra special growing up was that my mom made special costumes for us each year. We could be anything we wanted and she would create something wonderful for each of us. To this day, I’m not sure how she did it for three kids, but I’m sure it took many sleepless nights to make sure we were all taken care of. Some of my favorite costumes included a little lady bug, Raggedy Ann, a butterfly, a fairy princess, magician… Seriously, a little girl’s fantasy every Halloween. Thanks Mom!

I cherish those special memories. Now being a Mom myself, I decided that I wanted to continue this special feeling for my Kyrie. I want my little girl to enjoy the world of imagination and possibilities. I want to make memories that will last a lifetime!

Sooo, Kyrie is going to be Boo from Disney’s Monsters, Inc. I thought it would be perfect because she looks like a cute little Boo and Ryan would be a perfect Sulley (we’ll see if that happens). Also, since she won’t actually be trick-or-treating, I thought the little monster costume would keep her warm as we carry her around with her cousins.

I didn’t find too much online to help, and definitely no pattern, so I had to dream it up myself. Let me just preface this by saying, I am no great seamstress. I am largely self-taught and have learned by trial and a whole LOT of error. If you are a master seamstress, please don’t judge too harshly, there probably is a better way, but here’s how I did it…

The Plan:

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Note: I ended up using 4 layers of batting for the body and 1 layer for the hood and bottom.

The Materials:

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Note: Velcro and pipe stem cleaners are not pictured.

Cutting Out:

Cutting out the pieces. You can see the measurements and amounts I used on my plan above. Not an exact science, I just measured Kyrie and added in extra space for seam allowances, the bulk of the batting, and Boo’s costume isn’t snug in the movie, so she needs some comfy wiggle room. That’s how I came up with my sizing. She’s wearing 3 month clothes if that gives some perspective. I also decided that because my exterior purple fabric is a flimsy stretch fabric, I would iron on interfacing to give it some structure. Depending on what fabric you use, you may or may not need to do this too. For the arm holes, I went about 1.5″ from the top edge and used one of her shirts to determine the shape/size.

One final note, I realized after I had cut out my fabric, that I didn’t need to have two pieces for the back of the costume (I’ll explain later) so save yourself some trouble and just cut out two of the big piece.

We’ll talk construction next time, read it here.

–h