It's October! Time to ready the costumes and try not to eat all the candy on the seasonal aisle. For some reason, Reese's peanut butter pumpkins are so much more enticing than Reese's any other time of the year for me.
Stop calling my name, Reese's pumpkins! I have baby weight to lose!
Last year at this time, I was working on a big project, commuting, mothering a 20-month-old, and 5 months pregnant. To say I was tired was a total understatement. Then I came down with shingles. It was a really nutso time in my life.
I really wanted to phone it in and buy a pre-made costume, but I couldn't find anything that I liked. And yeah, there is a fairly cute, pre-made gnome costume floating around the internet, but I wanted something more akin to David the Gnome (please tell me you watched that on Nickelodeon also) rather than the garden gnome variety.
So, naturally, I decided to make my own! You can too, with some strategic purchases that you'll re-wear for the rest of the year, along with some super easy cutting and stitching. You might even have these items in your little guy's wardrobe already.
I can't believe he was so small last year. It goes too fast, too fast.
I started with a pair of GAP cords that, after the fact, he wore to church all winter long. I then added a blue sweater that came from GAP, however I couldn't find one for you from there this year, so below there's a link to one from Zara, and it has elbow patches. So cute. I've had a Zara sweater for him before, and it's good quality. A blue sweater is totally re-wearable without looking like a gnome.
Those boots? $15 at Wal-mart and in all sizes. They're called "chore boots." Re-wearable!
As a matter of fact, I plan on buying the pants and boots all over again for Jack's fall wardrobe simply because they are closet staples, and he outgrew last year's.
(Links to these items are all below the collage.)
Stop calling my name, Reese's pumpkins! I have baby weight to lose!
Last year at this time, I was working on a big project, commuting, mothering a 20-month-old, and 5 months pregnant. To say I was tired was a total understatement. Then I came down with shingles. It was a really nutso time in my life.
I really wanted to phone it in and buy a pre-made costume, but I couldn't find anything that I liked. And yeah, there is a fairly cute, pre-made gnome costume floating around the internet, but I wanted something more akin to David the Gnome (please tell me you watched that on Nickelodeon also) rather than the garden gnome variety.
So, naturally, I decided to make my own! You can too, with some strategic purchases that you'll re-wear for the rest of the year, along with some super easy cutting and stitching. You might even have these items in your little guy's wardrobe already.
I can't believe he was so small last year. It goes too fast, too fast.
I started with a pair of GAP cords that, after the fact, he wore to church all winter long. I then added a blue sweater that came from GAP, however I couldn't find one for you from there this year, so below there's a link to one from Zara, and it has elbow patches. So cute. I've had a Zara sweater for him before, and it's good quality. A blue sweater is totally re-wearable without looking like a gnome.
Those boots? $15 at Wal-mart and in all sizes. They're called "chore boots." Re-wearable!
As a matter of fact, I plan on buying the pants and boots all over again for Jack's fall wardrobe simply because they are closet staples, and he outgrew last year's.
(Links to these items are all below the collage.)
The hat is where you have to make any effort, as you can't just click "Add to shopping cart," followed by "Check out." A quick trip to Hobby Lobby yielded a yard of the stiffest red felt I could find, some fusible interfacing (don't be scared if you're not a seamstress!) to make it stiffer, and elastic. Mr. G stopped by our local costume warehouse and grabbed a white beard.
I followed this tutorial for the pattern of the hat. It tells you how to measure the head and all that technical stuff. After I cut out the felt, I ironed on the fusible interfacing (see, that's not scary), and hand stitched the hat together. The internet is so magical that I even found you a handstitching tutorial here. I then hand stitched the elastic on (it will look like a giant party hat) before tacking on the beard (more hand stitching.)
I had to trim the beard down a bit, but it was much easier than buying some fake fur or what not from Hobby Lobby. (Believe me, I tried. Don't be tempted. It was a mess.) I also cut the mustache off. We were dealing with a toddler, you understand.
I made the hat about 2 hours before we went to our church's fall festival. It took maybe 20 minutes. (Cleaning up the failed fake white fur mess took a bit longer.)
See? Super easy.
I hope this helps another crazy busy mama who's looking for a cute and unique costume!
No comments:
Post a Comment