When I was asking my oldest what she wanted to be for Halloween this year, she replied with the answer that I am sure every other 5 year old girl replied when asked the same question: "Elsa". In the event that my youngest would have said she wanted to be Anna, we would have totally gone with the Frozen theme this year... especially since we already had the dress ups in our closet. (I honestly don't care what they choose to be for Halloween. I leave it totally up to them.) But, it wasn't meant to be... The youngest was set on Sheriff Callie. So if you read my last couple posts, you saw that I was forced into handmade Halloween costumes this Halloween.
It really isn't a big deal. I know so many awesome moms make Halloween costumes every year... and who knows, maybe this was a first of many years of handmade Halloween costumes in our house. (never say never right?) But I was not super excited to do handmade in the beginning... just because it ends up being more expensive to buy the supplies and it takes way more time obviously.
After I got over the initial feelings of not wanting to be making costumes, I started to enjoy it. My girls were so excited to take part in putting the costumes together. Since our playroom and my studio are in the very same room, they played and would come check on the progress and try on their costumes along the way. It was a lot of fun.
So since I was making one costume already, I offered to make the other a costume for her to be whatever she wanted. She didn't really have any ideas of what I could make, so I showed her a couple things in the Oliver + S Little Things to Sew book. (it really is the greatest book... I love it)
Once she saw the Little Red Riding Hood pattern, she was sold. Little Red is a favorite story in our home.
I made the hood with red micro corduroy (picked up at hobby lobby) for the outside and a red and white gingham fabric for the inside, which was a poly-blend so it was super lightweight (also hobby lobby). This combo was a dream. I loved that the cord was slightly heavier than reg. quilting cotton and the gingham was so lightweight which made the drape of the cape perfect. Also- since I didn't use quilting cotton, it isn't as prone to wrinkles. I made the smaller version of the two cape patterns for my 5 year old and it works great, especially since she is pretty tiny and my 4 year old also likes to play with it, but I would opt for the large size for 5 years and older definitely. The only modification that I made to the hood was that I left off the button closure and used gingham ribbon (hobby lobby) to make ties.
I decided to pair it with the tutu pattern in the book to make it a bit more frilly. I got all of my tulle at Hobby Lobby. I used a combo of 2 layers dark cranberry red tulle on the bottom of the skirt, then 4 layers of cherry red tulle, and 1 layer of cream tulle. I also picked up my ribbon for the waistband at hobby lobby too.
The last element for the costume was Little Red's basket. I found the perfect basket at Hobby Lobby and used leftovers of the fabrics and ribbon to make a quick liner and bow to dress things up a bit. It was perfect because she used this basket to hold the treats while trick or treating. I am all for functional props!
The cutest thing about the costume, was how much she loved it and how darling she looked once she was all dressed up. She even took 1st place at our wards trunk or treat. (Little sis was a bit miffed because last year in our old ward big sis also took 1st place for her store bought Doc McStuffins costume, so little sis thought that this was her year to take the prize. Luckily daddy won the award for best cornbread, so there were blue ribbons for both of them to pin to their costumes. ha ha)
I hope y'all have a wonderful and very safe Halloween!
xoxo, Ashley
