Halloween Costuming

Halloween is my favorite holiday. Autumn is my favorite season, and I love the costumes. Plus, what other holiday do you happily open your door (repeatedly) to complete strangers and give them something? Each year I end up making one costume. This year Anais wants to be Enchantress (she's a green clad villain in the Thor world). So, while I struggle to make a mini bustier for my kid (ha ha - she's getting straps, even if they are clear!), I thought I'd share last year's costume for Anais: Astrid from How to Train Your Dragon (she likes those strong women types).

I loved the way it turned out with the exception of the pink Velcro on the arm pieces. Yeah, that was a mistake. But, I found out the Halloween parade at the school was in a day or two (a week before Halloween), and I had yet to finish (er... start?) the arm pieces... so it was a late night and all I had in my sewing stash was PINK velcro. Ah well. It didn't show a lot of the time (though it does in that photo). She had to wear the costume over regular clothes for school to take the costume off after the parade... so the black tee-shirt isn't part of the outfit.

The biggest challenge was the shoulder armor - and it ended up my favorite part. I lucked out when I found Knight helmets at the Dollar Store with those visors - once I pried them from the hat/helmet, they were the perfect shape as a base (no chicken wire needed!). I papier mached (nothing fancy - just water and flour) over those. Strips of paper for the bands. I found for the spikes, I had best control and the finer detail over laundry lint instead of shredded paper (who knew that bag of lint by the dryer would come in handy?). Once it dried, I used a silver metallic and black watery paint  - a couple messy coats.

The skulls on her shoulders and skirt I made out of Sculpty clay. After I cooked them, I soaked them in coffee for a couple of days.  It was a lot of little projects, but I just had so much fun with it.