I wasn't even sure if the idea in my head would turn out - and there's nothing like waiting until the day before to even attempt to make a costume without having anything for a backup! Thankfully it DID turn out OK and I took pics of the process as I flew by the seat of my pants trying to make it all work!
I'm more excited that Katelyn was actually WEARING this - lately anything you put on her head gets ripped off 2 seconds later and when I was making this costume she was on and off about the whole thing. But I got a few pictures of her in it for this post and I have my *fingers crossed* she'll put up with it tomorrow LOL.
Anywho - like I said this costume was just a random idea in my head that started with a bunch of packages of felt from My Favorite Things. I didn't have a pattern or anything to go by - and my sewing skills are non-existent. I didn't attempt to sew anything on this - it's all held together with hot glue and hope.
To start off I needed a "base" for the "wings" (arms), front and back. The wings are 2 sheets of Whip Cream felt that I cut to a roughly oval shape.
The front was another full sheet of Whip Cream felt that I cut a bit off for each shoulder and the neckline.
For the back I cut off the corners of a full sheet and cut it in half as I intend for the costume to tie up in the middle of the back.
For the feathers I just sketched out a teardrop shape onto some grid paper and cut two of them out (to have a backup).
I then cut a TON of feathers from Whip Cream, Hot Fudge, Kraft and Orange Fizz felt. I don't have an exact number but it was well over 100 (prolly close to 150) feathers. I doubled up on all the felt and cut 2 at a time so it didn't take as long. I got about 13-14 feathers per sheet.
Some of the feathers I snipped with sharp scissors to make them look more realistic - I only did this to a handful of them b/c it would take all day otherwise.
The quickest way to do this was fold the feathers in half and then snip - trying not to snip them in half (did that a couple of times...)
Finally to adhere the feathers I started at the bottom of each "base" piece and staggered the feathers randomly. I used a dot of hot glue at the top of each feather to adhere - I used quite a bit of glue sticks for this!
Finally once all the feathers were adhered I flipped them over and glued some Hot Fudge MFT grosgrain ribbon along the top of each piece just for some extra strength, then attached them all together with some lighter weight brown ribbon. I made sure the ribbon was long enough to have a good amout hanging off each end to be able to tie it easily.
Finally for the owl "face" I just sketched another template onto the grid paper along with a smaller feather.
I cut the base from Hot Fudge felt and the feathers from the other 3 colors, all of which I snipped.
To finish it off I die cut circles with MFT Circle STAX Die-namics from Kraft and Whip Cream felt and layered them with large Hot Fudge buttons for the eyes. The beak was just a small feather cut in half.
I was going to adhere ribbon to it to just tie it onto Katelyn's head but I KNEW that would be a pain (trying to get her to stay still long enough to tie it on would be impossible), and I remembered I had some kraft-colored elastic in my stash so I measured her head and adhered a piece to the owl face so it's stretchy and slips onto her head easily!
Trying to get pics of her IN it were another story. This kid can't stay still for more than a nano-second and I chased her around the yard trying to get a decent pic and it was just pure luck I got the one at the top of this post <3 <3 <3
Happy Halloween!
