Sweater Refashion and Pleather Hand Cut Skirt

Hop over to check out the pleather skirt, complete with tutorial and printable pattern/ template!

So on to the sweater.

 It got tight having to avoid those stripes in the original sweater, but worked out.
I used the toddler blouse pattern from a few weeks ago for the sleeves and body.

But this time, the placket was in the back with three flower shaped buttons.


This thinner, slinky, sweater fabric was kind of a pain to work with.
I made sure to serge all the seams to prevent fraying, and the whole placket definitely required interfacing for support.
I used the original hem for both the sleeves and body to help make it look more like a woven sweater rather than a tee shirt or something.
Plus it makes it easier to sew with no hemming!

So together with the pleather skirt, two easy and quick garments for fall and winter.
This lollipop Ellie was eating was her last piece of Halloween candy.
Sad day for her.

 Don't forget to catch the whole tutorial and pattern for the skirt HERE!

Last week I took down all our Halloween decor.

Usually I hop right into Christmas, but we've had unusually warm weather so it doesn't feel like Christmas yet.

So for the first time, I'm decorating a little for fall/ Thanksgiving...or trying a little. 

On our mantle I put our few little pumpkins that fit and weren't carved or painted, then I asked our neighbor if I could cut some branches from her tree that had yellow leaves and red berries.
She probably thought I was weird, but I think it's pretty and was really easy to just plop them in a big glass jar.

I also moved the real leaf garland to the mantle.

Along with this lantern I made over from a light fixture.

Easy, free and took 5 minutes!  And it will all just go in the compost when it looks bad in a few weeks, so nothing to store which is nice as I'm still trying to figure out how to store Jack the Pumpkin King and Zero the ghost dog.

Part two of our Halloween Costumes even though Halloween is now over.

whole family here.

So for the kids we had Gru and a minion from the movie Despicable Me.

So for RJ we had him be Gru, and it's not that much of a costume.
Just black pants and t-shirt we already had with is church shoes.
But we did make the scarf by dying a navy/white stripe knit I had black.

He did have his ghost costume he wore to some things as well that is a little more exciting on its own.

RJ is a very protective older brother which transfers to a controlling master over his minion, which she resents from time to time.

On to the minion.

RJ decided she should be a one-eye minion, and I designed the costume so the mouth was her face.

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I hacked this minion costume together last Friday during her nap barely in time for a party that afternoon.  We got to the house and RJ had to help me force Ellie into the costume, all the while she was crying.  I was laughing, and considering what a ridiculous mom I am shoving a toddler in a costume while she wails, and here's the picture we got.

  The eye goggles on the front were from felt and a mason jar ring I painted silver.

The goggles strap is black elastic I sewed the to outer layer before it was stuffed.

 Happy Halloween!

Here our the Halloween costumes for our family this year:


We're all characters from the kids movie, Despicable Me.
I got the idea for these costumes a few months ago when my belly started showing with this pregnancy.  RJ told me I looked like Vector (who has a middle aged man gut) and would always love for me to say "Oh yeah!  Oh yeah!" and stick my belly out.

If you haven't seen the movie, here is where the Vector character is introduced...OH YEAH!

So trying to think of maternity Halloween costumes led me to go with the whole Despicable Me family theme this year.  Kind of selfish, but our Halloween revolved around my pregnant belly and needing to costume it somehow, luckily the rest of the fam liked their assigned roles...except for maybe Ellie.

In case you can't tell who we are:
Me= Vector: pirhana gun weilding villain

RJ= Gru: villain determined to steal the moon

Ellie= minion: mindless servant to Gru

Rhett=Dr. Nefario: old man scientist who works for Gru in the laboratory

I'm planning to post the other costumes separately this week, so here's a little about mine.

It is a total hacked job during one afternoon nap trying to sew as fast as I could just to whip it out, so the ankles and wrists aren't even hemmed.

I used an athletic mini mesh because it was the cheapest orange fabric I could find, so I have to wear leggings and a shirt underneath, but that's OK since it was snowing a few days ago here.

The front is only a zipper half way, I faked the bottom half by just top stitching twill tape down the center.

This is a funny clip where they discuss Vector's wardrobe and I realized I should have had a black fanny-pack to complete the costume!

It was kind of fun to dress up pregnant actually.

Someone that knows I am expecting even asked me if the belly was real or if I stuffed it.

Oh no, it's real, and I've still got 12 weeks to go.

If I was huge full term pregnant I had an even better Halloween costume idea.

This year we added to our Nightmare Before Christmas life-size collection.

Last year we made Jack Skellington, tutorial here.

 

We made the next character and went with the easier option by making the ghost dog, Zero.

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So zero is pretty simple.  I started by making a wire skeleton. 

The joints were secured with duct tape strips.

I WISH I'D SPRAYED THE FRAME WITH WHITE PRIMER SPRAY PAINT AT THIS POINT.

 I added a cheap Christmas red bulb for the nose, taping it to the wire head frame.

 So now Zero joins his master on our front porch.

He actually hangs on the other side of the front door from fishing line to look like he's a hovering ghost dog.

I'm hoping next year I'll feel up to making a life-size Sally to finish the trio.