Halloween Costume 2013

This year my sweet little girl decided in September that she wanted to be a butterfly for Halloween.  My mom always made my costumes from scratch.  I love this tradition and have always said I want to continue it with my children.  Last year was pretty easy, I had to do a little stitching to get the ears to stay on her lamb head piece, but otherwise I made it work with fabric glue.  This year, however, was a bit more involved.  I should also mention that I love to sew, so the reason I try and stay away from it is not that I don't like to sew or don't know how.  I try to stay away from sewing intensive projects because I do not own a sewing machine and the only person I know who does (my mom), lives 400 miles away.  And her sewing machine is one of those really ancient ones that is attached to the sewing table, so she couldn't even bring it if she came for a visit.

There is now the problem of how to make wings for my little butterfly.  I didn't want to just buy her the pre-made ones, so I decided to hand stitch a set of wings, and sew them to her shirt so she could flap her wings.  Ambitious, I know, but I wanted it to be special.

I started my project before I started this blog, but I will do my best to post step-by-step pictures and descriptions below.  If you have a sewing machine, it is an easy to replicate costume, and if you have time on your hands, sewing it by hand was not too bad.

I started by buying 2 square yards of fabric (pink and orange, per Maddie's request).  This made cutting the "pattern" easier.  I ironed out the wrinkles and folded the fabric in half, one on top of the other.  I used the black long sleeve tee to measure how far out the wings should span, drew half of a butterfly wing and cut it out from both pieces of fabric.

We decided that the pink was going to be the top of the wings and the orange was going to be the underside.  I cut out some geometric shapes from the remaining orange fabric and used fabric glue to stick them to the pink wings for some added decoration.

Once the glue dried, I spread the pink wings face up, and matched the orange wings face down to the pink wings.  Then I pinned all around the edges.  This is where the majority of the time was spent because then I stitched all around the edge, save for about an eight inch gap that was left open to turn the wings right side out.

After stitching around the outer edge, I turned the wings right side out and slip-stitched the opening closed.

Then I sprayed the underside of the wings (the orange part) with sparkly spray paint.  Before going to bed the night I made this, Maddie said, "Don't forget the glitter,Mama!" I made sure this sucker was glittery.

I then pinned the wings to the black tee.  The tops of the wings were pinned to the underside of the arms and I pinned the center of the wings down the center of the shirt to make sure everything was centered and stayed attached.

I stitched down the center of the wings first to better anchor them in place (plus it was the easiest part to sew!). Then I slip stitched down one arm from the center, then down the other arm to the center.

Finally, I used Elmer's Glue to outline the geometric shapes and cover the stitches down the back of the wings and added more glitter.

Add in some black pants and some antennae and she was good to go!

On a side note, she had so much fun trick-or-treating!  This was the first year we went and she and I are already looking forward to next year :)