Halloween costumes – Doctor Who!

I am back after an extremely crazy Kids Clothes Week!

I so inconveniently decided to fall ill with bronchitis during KCW, and in the week leading up to Halloween no less!

We usually do two costumes for L: one is a group costume that we do as a family when we go to our friend’s annual Halloween party, and a different costume for L to wear at daycare for their little parade.

Our group costume was the Doctor (Eleven, if you must know), his TARDIS, and a Dalek. OBVS L had to be the Dalek so I whipped up a Geranium dress… because when else can I make a dress for my son? I sewed up a 3T and lengthened the skirt and also cut it as an A-line skirt rather than gathered. I was playing this by ear so I initially thought I would need a yellowish fabric to start with so I bought Hawthorne Thread’s Solid in Goldenrod. I later decided to use fabric spray paint to make it really gold so I picked up a couple of bottles of this stencil spray at Jo-Ann’s. It turned out looking great on the outside but bled horribly onto the inside. A nice plus was that the fabric stiffened up quite a bit so the skirt really stayed flared out, which I think worked nicely. What worked for me was spraying one whole side, then smoothing it all out with a foam brush. It was a bit streaky and drippy so going over it with the brush gave it better and more even coverage.

I threw it in the wash after I’d finished painting and letting it dry, but now I’m afraid it’s rather wrinkly and I’m not keen to iron all that paint. Well, lesson learned.

I cut out a million felt circles for the Dalek bumps and painted them with gold glitter paint. Why didn’t I spray paint them? I don’t know, I did a lot of this at night and I don’t think straight after 8:30pm. Those suckers got Mod Podged on… I tried sewing them on and my machine was NOT having it. It dried pretty hard since I did about four coats to get the glittery goodness I wanted.

By Saturday morning I had just about had it with the Dalek costume, and the party was that evening so I just Sharpied the black details on the bodice. I’d had grand plans of cutting out little black rectangles and sewing them on but that was so not happening after I’d been working on it every day after work for a week while fighting bronchitis. Just… no.

We had some failed attempts at making the Dalek gun and eye stalk, but I gave up trying to figure out how to attach the eye stalk to the kid’s head, and Liam hated the Dalek gun hanging off him so that was taken off pronto. Doubt we even have any pictures of it.

And now TARDIS dress pictures!!! I used the Ruby dress pattern because it’s the simplest dress pattern I have (man, Rae really helped me out this Halloween!) and I figured the lack of darts and seams would make the best palette for TARDIS details.

I do have to tell you guys that I emailed Hawthorne Threads to ask for help picking out a good match for TARDIS blue and I got such a thoughtful, helpful response that appeared to be crowdsourced from multiple Whovians over at Hawthorne Threads. The best, guys. The best. And their recommendation was spot on – I bought Free Spirit Designer Solid in Admiral and I think it’s perfect.

I cut out rectangles for the front paneling. I should have sewn them on with darker thread or layered a darker fabric beneath but… that wasn’t something  I noticed until after sewing them all on and looking at pictures. Oh well.

ALSO, THEY’RE ALL POCKETS. I think it’s keeping in the vein of “bigger on the inside” to have so many pockets.

I hand embroidered POLICE BOX on the yoke but left out the PUBLIC CALL… it was getting too tiny and I’m really not a great embroiderer to begin with 😦

I went the easy route for the TARDIS sign and printed it on iron on transfer paper. Correction – I sent my husband to his parents’ house to do this because we don’t have a printer. And he had to go back and redo it because I forgot to tell him to flip the image so it would transfer correctly. Oops.

Besides the pockets, I think the windows are my favorite part. They’re just so cute. Love them.

And I’m so glad I made myself a TARDIS dress.

Husband was the Doctor, and I kid you not, the entire costume is pulled out of his current wardrobe. He seriously already dresses like Eleven. I’d say that’s why I married him except we didn’t discover Doctor Who until after we were married.

Kid approved, as you can see.

This is already a ridiculously long post so I will have to save L’s other costume for tomorrow! Also I still need to upload the pictures of this costume. Always last minute here…

 

Ruby Dress in Bouquet Sprout

Can I just say that I love the entire Juliana Horner line at Jo-Ann’s? Because I totally do.

I bought a couple yards of the Bouquet Sprout knowing I wanted to make a dress. I also bought a yard of Garden Main Floral, not knowing what I’ll be doing with it – I’m thinking maybe lining for a bag? I also really want to get a couple of yards of Rosebed Pomegranate but I’m slowly drowning in fabric so I resisted the temptation.

I snapped up the Ruby Dress by Rae because I’m a sucker for dresses with no closures. Rae is definitely a girl after my own heart. The Ruby pattern is even easier than the Washi. At this point I could make the Washi dress with my eyes closed, having made about eight or so (I don’t know, I need to take inventory) by now.

I took in quite a bit from both sides from just below the bustline to the hem. I do tend to need to do a full-bust adjustment, but luckily on this pattern it was just a matter to cutting a Medium and grading down the waist and skirt portion to a Small.

I bound the edges with some premade yellow bias binding. Super easy! I do prefer the look of binding inside so I folded it under and topstitched down.

I used the Bouquet Sprout and some Robert Kaufman Interweave Chambray in Slate. Tell me why I only bought three yards of the chambray? I want a whole bolt.

I think these two fabrics go reaaaally well together. I wear it a lot with the mustard yellow belt but I’ve also worn it with a silver belt and a brown woven leather belt. I don’t think I have the guts to wear it sans belt though – too topheavy.

 

I am clearly still learning how to use my remote. I don’t know if I’ll ever get the hang of hiding the stupid thing.

That’s all for now! I have some Parsley pants (I know, this blog should just be renamed Everything Rae Hoekstra Does is Unicorns and Rainbows) and some other dresses that I need to photograph/blog! I’ll need to practice with my remote!