Costume making and knitting

It's been busy here with sewing and knitting.

Here's little Patric's parrot costume. Luc wants to be a pirate so once he gets his costume and puts it on, I'll show you a photo. This costume idea came from a link that was sent to me by Mary Anne of Magpie's Mumblings. She sent it to me as an addition to the boys' tickle trunk. Little did she know that I was supposed to make Patric a parrot costume. The timing was perfect. Thank you Mary Anne. All the felt, stuffing and fleece came from my stash.

And on the knitting front, I made another hat for little Teemu. I finished it in time for the little girls to try on so I could see if the size was right for them. I just have to find some nice soft yarn. I bought this Red Heart yarn because I wanted to make a hat and I wanted to use variegated yarn.

I'm linking up with The Needle and Thread Network.

Hallowe'en costume

BABY FLASH

Mini quilts and Hallowe'en sewing

I finished the little Hallowe'en quilts.

 My daughter has yet to pick this one up.

My youngest son got this one

  and this one with the cat went to my eldest son. It was appropriate since he and his wife have two black cats.

This is the backing for all of them. I have wanted to use it up for a long time. I still have lots of it left so I guess I have to make more Hallowe'en quilts in the future. I sewed a ring to the back of all the quilts so that they can be hung on a nail. I machine quilted them at the same time that I sewed the fused pieces on. I also tried out that spray baste. Sticky, yukky but it did work. I have not washed them. They may shrink.

I am now working on costumes. I made 4 more cuffs for my son and his girlfriend who are going as Musketeers. Two cuffs have already been picked up - with the quilt. I now have to make a couple of tabards and boot covers.

This is the fabric my son chose. Royal blue is the colour he wanted and we found some in fleece. Fabricland had a sale on lace and so the eyelet was buy one metre and get 3 for free. We got 8 metres and it's going to be sewn on the tabards. I told him that when Hallowe'en is over I'd like the tabards back (no one ever wears anything from one year to the next.) I thought I could make little Luc an outfit or two out of the fabric. Luc's mom immediately thought of Superman for next year. I was thinking more along the lines of a pair of pants and a jacket. There's a lot of fleece so I'm sure I can get lots of things for the little guy out of it.

My other son is going as Peter Pan. He and his wife found a wool crepe dress in the perfect colour green (but it does not show up in this photo or the one above) at Value Village. Someone had made the dress but not finished it. I washed it on the delicate cycle, took out an elastic that was sewn at the waist and ripped open the side seams. I have to cut some fabric off the hem and add it to the sides since the dress was a tight fit. There may be enough to make a hat but we'll see.

Wednesday

So, this is what I am working on.

What the heck is that?

A wrist band?

Almost, but no, it's a cuff. My daughter has an off white blouse and she wanted ruffled, wide cuffs on the sleeves for her Hallowe'en costume. She knows I have a lot of fabric. For some reason this piece of muslin was just sitting around waiting for the right opportunity to be put to use. I only had to cut off a small piece to make it into a rectangle and then cut the rectangle in half. After that I had to figure out how to construct (sew) the cuff. It took some thinking but I have now perfected my technique and it's a good thing too since my youngest son liked the way they turned out and has requested two for him and two for his girlfriend. They will be going as musketeers. Those costumes have yet to be sewn and then there's Peter Pan...

Go on over to  http://needleandthreadnetwork.blogspot.com/  to see what other people are working on.

Hallowe'en already?

It's actually Thanksgiving weekend here in Canada and right now it is more like summer - not fall. The weather has been simply gorgeous with temperatures in the mid 20s for the past few days. Today it got up to 23 and tomorrow it's supposed to be 27. Thanksgiving Monday is predicted to be around 26.

I have not been idle - I have been busy in the sewing studio. My middle daughter went to see her only nephew, little Luc, and she brought a few things with her. Luc's mom asked me if I wanted to have some fun and make him a costume for Hallowe'en. It seems that the neighbours are expecting him to be trick or treating on the 31st. At first it was to be Superman but then she said I could make a Flash, a Green Lantern or a Superman costume. Well, off I went to check the pattern company offerings online. I didn't even know that they made costumes starting at 1/2 size and going up from there. I decided to go with Simplicity 2506 and I used the little mouse version minus the ears, bow tie and belly. I chose to make Flash since he is mainly all one colour - red. I purchased some nice arctic fleece so that little Luc would be warm and also so that the one piece outfit could be used after Hallowe'en.

This is how the final costume turned out. I was advised by my eldest son that the symbol on the chest had to be there. I could forget other stuff but that symbol was a must. I hadn't even noticed it when I did my research on the outfit.

I made two pair of bootees. The yellow ones are for the costume and the red ones are to be sewn on after Hallowe'en so that the red fleece one piece can be worn when little Luc goes out daily with his dad. The centre symbol is just basted on and the belt has velcro on the back. I made the hood/helmet out of red flannel since it is two layers (it is fully lined) and fleece would have made it too thick.

It got the seal of approval and when little Luc tries it on, I will hopefully get a photo.

I have sewn a quilt top but it needs to be made bigger. Once it is put together I will post a photo before it goes on the frame. Right now though,I need to sort out sewing studio and bring it to some sort of order so I can find things.

Happy Turkey weekend!