Today’s contributor is Jill from Snugglebug University. All posts written by Jill for Make It and Love It can be found HERE.
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Hi, it’s Jill from Snugglebug University. My kids have been excitedly planning their Halloween costumes for for months! I have to admit I am pretty excited that they picked Alice in Wonderland. I can’t wait to share the costumes with you today!
Over the past five years, my family/kids coordinated costumes FOUR times! This year is Alice in Wonderland, but we’ve also dressed up as the Frozen crew, a veterinarian (plus doggie patient), and then last year the girls were fairies.
I love themed costumes…and I LOVE these Alice in Wonderland costumes for the whole family!
I think the really wonderful thing about Alice in Wonderland is that the costumes are actually somewhat easy to throw together with things you already have, or can buy cheaply. And the costumes don’t have to be of super high quality either, because your kids won’t be wearing these costumes every day. It’s totally okay to take some short cuts!
I did make Alice’s dress–which was the most labor intensive of all of them–but the truth is that I totally didn’t have to. A simple blue dress would have been totally worked, and then all I would have had to make is a simple apron!
I opted to take a simple dress pattern and adapt it a little bit to look more Alice-like. I added the collar and the white piece to the bodice. The skirt is separate from the dress and ties on separately. I’m going to show you how you can take pretty much any basic dress pattern and turn it into an Alice dress.
Lu LOVES being Alice from Alice in Wonderland.
She loves to read, so being a character out of a book was about the best thing ever. Lu says that she wants to get a blonde wig to wear with it, but I kind of love it just the way it is.
Ellie’s costume was a lot easier to put together. A few basic supplies from Walmart: a long sleeve shirt, leggings, and a headband and this costume was practically done!
I bought a small amount of fake pink fur to add the stripes, a tail, and made some ears. It was a totally easy sewing project, though…and just so cute!
I made the mouth simply by drawing the small on foam board (that I picked up at the dollar store) and taping it to a dowel.
The tail is just pinned to the back of her pants.
The kids REALLY wanted my husband and I to dress up with them, and so I threw together a few easy costumes for the both of us.
We found an old sweater vest for him to wear, and then I added the felt hat and the bow tie. Very simple. He was such a good sport! (And to be honest, he was also pretty excited that the girls didn’t make him dress up as a unicorn or a princess!)
Again, a very simple costume with the help of some leftover bunny ears from Easter. My kids thought it was an appropriate costume because I’m always running around telling them that they are going to be late! Hah! It is TRUE!
October is always a busy month for us, so I’m really happy to have my Halloween costumes done early this year. (In fact, if I weren’t making this post for Make It and Love It I’d probably be throwing these costumes together the night before Halloween!) What I really love about these costumes though are that you totally could throw them together at the last minute.
Alright, who is ready to make some Alice and Wonderland Costumes?
I’m going to guide you through all of the costumes, starting with the easier ones first.
First, though, let’s talk about what you’ll need.
Cheshire Cat (this is what I used for my daughter who is a size 5T):
Alice in Wonderland (this was what I used for my tall 7 year old, about a size 8):
The White Rabbit:
The Mad Hatter:
I really love how this costume uses a basic shirt and leggings. They are cheap and require less sewing! Let’s break this costume down:
Pretty simple, right?
The first thing to do is to cut stripes of pink fur to go over your t-shirt.
Since the t-shirt is made out of knit fabric, I made sure to sew on the stripes with a stretch stitch.
For the tail, all you have to do is fold a piece of fur over and sew up the two sides, as shown below.
I just used a safety pin to “tie” up the ends, and then I pinned that directly to my daughter’s leggings.
For the ears, cut out two triangles from fur (two for each ear) and sew on stripes of purple felt.
Placing the right sides together, you’ll need to sew around the sides of the triangle, leaving the base open. Turn right side out.
Add a little bit of poly-fil to each ear.
Then you can use the glue gun to fold over the sides of the ear and attach it to the headband.
Such cute little ears, don’t you think? This simple project finishes out the Cheshire cat costume!
The Mad Hatter costume is super simple! This black hat is actually the Magician’s Hat that I made using Crystal’s top hat tutorial. I’m going to show you how I spruced it up a bit and added a bow tie to pull the whole costume together.
Once you’ve made your hat, you can simply add some 1.5 inch ribbon around it. I hot glued it in place. Two pieces of felt with some sticky felt numbers make up the price tag. All you have to do is sew around the edges to make the sign more sturdy.
For the bow time, cut out two rectangles of fabric. Sew all around the rectangles, leaving open a small space for turning.
Turn right side out, and fold in the open area. You can sew a topstitch along the edges to close the area you left open. Then tie a knot in the middle of the bow time and use a safety pin to attach it to your shirt.
Here’s another simple one! You only need to make two things for the White Rabbit: the appliqued heart shirt and the clock! I paired it with a black jacket I already had.
There is really no tutorial needed for either of these. Unsure how to applique a design onto a t-shirt? I’ve recently done a tutorial about this on my blog, and you can see how this shirt was made!
The clock was made simply by drawing straight on white foam board with a sharpie and painting the edges with gold acrylic paint.
That brings us to the very last (and most complicated) costume! Alice!
Alice’s dress can really be made from any dress pattern, as long as it is made in light blue fabric.
In my case I modified a McCall’s M5793 pattern. Alternatively you can easily make your own pattern with your child’s clothes.
There were a few details that I really wanted my Alice in Wonderland dress to have, primarily an accent piece with buttons on the bodice, an apron and a dress with a collar. Now I’m going to show you how you can add these extra details to whatever dress pattern you are using to make your Alice dress.
Before you begin sewing your dress bodice together, cut out an accent piece for the front of the bodice. I cut two pieces out of white fabric, and one out of lace.
You can then place the lace between the two white layers of fabric.
Sew around the edges leaving the top open. Turn right side out. Sew to attach the piece to the bodice.
The bodice in my dress is made up of both and exterior and a lining. This is really ideal, because you can incorporate the collar into the seam that sews the bodice front to the bodice lining.
Since my pattern didn’t have a collar pattern piece, I made my own. I took the bodice piece (after I attached the bodice front to the bodice back at the shoulders) and traced the curve of the neckline. I stopped an inch or so from the back, because this region will be tucked in when the zipper is added.
Then connect the two end points, curving both ends. Cut out 4 pieces (2 reverse) out of white fabric.
Place the right sides together and sew around the edges, leaving the top open.
Clip the curves, turn right side out, and top stitch around the edges if desired. Pin and then baste to the top of the bodice.
Now when you sew the bodice front to the bodice lining, you will incorporate the collar into the seam.
Assemble the rest of your dress bodice as per your instructions. If you’d like some “slip” layers, just add them in when you do the skirt.
Finally, I added a little piece of black ribbon to make a bow above the buttons.
The apron is made using 1 lace rectangle and two layers of white fabric. The size of my rectangle was 20 inches by 34 inches.
The two sash pieces were 46 inches by 5 inches.
Begin by placing the right sides together of the main apron piece and sew up all of the sides, leaving the top open. Turn right side out.
When turned right side out, the front of your apron should consist of a layer of lace over a white piece of quilting cotton.
Gather along the top of the apron skirt and place in between the two sash pieces. Pin to the sash pieces, and sew up along the edge of the sash, just along the top of the sash (where the gathers are).
When you turn the sash pieces right side out, you’ll notice that the top is open. Fold down the raw edges. Iron, folding the raw edges inside, and then sew all around the edge of the sash, securing the sash front to the sash back.
That completes the apron piece!
Ta-da! That completes Alice!
I hoped you enjoyed seeing my family’s costumes this year! Click on over to my blog to see some of my favorite family Halloween costumes over the past 5 years.
Thank you so much for having me here on Make It and Love It!
–Jill
You can follow Jill on her blog (snugglebuguniversity.com), on instagram, on pinterest, and on facebook.
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Looking for more family-friendly costume ideas that you can make yourself?
Check out a few of these gems:
Halloween Costumes 2013: The Whole TANGLED Crew (plus a video!!)
Halloween Costumes 2012: Little Red Riding Hood Crew
Halloween Costumes 2011: Mary Poppins