Making a Colossal Squid costume

Since it is October and Halloween is quickly aproaching and I have since switched blogs since I wrote this post, I am bringing it over here. I am sure there are not that many people who have children who love the ocean and sea creatures as much as my child, but you can use this basic idea for many kinds of animal costumes. All of Potter Barn kids animal costumes are made out of felt so you could get an idea from one of theirs and create your own pattern.

Patrick loves Animals and always has. Recently he has taken interest in marine life and especially Colossal Squids. When we went to the beach this summer he was hoping to find either a shark or a squid. He had his goggles on face down in the ocean in hopes of a run in with one most of the time we were there. I didn’t want to burst his bubble that he probably wasn’t going to find one in 3 feet of water. But hey, a boy can hope! As you can imagine, Discovery Channel’s annual Shark Week last week, made him excited all over again about dangerous marine life. While I think mid August is a little early to start thinking about Halloween costumes, I was not entirely sure I could make this costume. And if it was a fail, then I needed a back up. Costco starts carrying their Halloween costumes the first week of August and they are gone and picked over by September. And when you have to buy 4 kids costumes that $15 price tag is about as cheep as it comes. Now I make the kids costumes about every other year. And I have found in general it is WAY more expensive to make one than to buy one. So this time I made no promises that I could make this. When I priced this out I was shocked that Felt was SO cheep! It was $6 for one yard but that 1 yard is also 2 yards wide. Then I spent .75c on the black and white pieces that I used for the eyes. The pompoms that I used for the suckers on the bottom of the tentacles were $2. And the bag of Poly-Fil I used to stuff the fin, head, tentacles, and eyes with was $3. So the whole costume was $11.75+ tax! Not to shabby. Now on to making this thing. In the past making a costume took me a few weeks. But that was using cotton fabrics and a pattern. I started sewing when I was a kid with my mom. And in high school I took apparel. So I have had lots of practice following patterns and sewing “speak.” But sewing a costume with out a pattern was new to me. I found a blog of a woman who made a Colossal Squid for her equally obsessed little girl, but she made it in pink.http://thechroniclesofthefeaseys.blogspot.com/2011/11/giant-squid-halloween-costume.html?m=1She said she used felt, bubble wrap and ginormous amounts of hot glue. As soon as she mentioned that she burned her finger prints off for good from the hot glue gun, I knew I would be sewing this thing. Since I had never worked with felt I was not sure how it would react when I tried to sew with it. It was remarkably easy! I was able to sew 4 layers at some points no problem. And best if all you do not have to finish any of the edges because it does not fray.

Now on to what you are waiting for sewing instructions:

Materials:

1 yard of 72 inch felt

1 bag of Poly-Fil

1 bag of white pompoms

2 pieces of white felt

1 piece of black felt

Yard stick

Sewing tape measure

Pencil

Sewing scissors

Set of nested mixing bowls

Hot glue gun

Sewing machine

Red, black and white thread

First measure your child. Measure the circumference of their shoulders and waist. Measure from the top of their head to their waist where you want the costume body to stop. Then measure from costume stop at their waist to their feet for the tentacle length. Write down their measurements. Now to determine the height of the costume I had Patrick hold up his hands to the sky and I measured from his head to his wrists and that is how I decided how tall to make the costume (kinda unscientific) so I added the head to hand height to the head to waist height to determine the full body size of the costume. To decide how wide to make the costume I took that shoulder width to make sure that was the widest part and then went straight down from there. Every thing above made a gradual point. Make sure you leave sewing allowances, meaning take into account that you will loose width to where you have to sew the pieces together.

I traced out by hand the shape I wanted and folded the fabric in half so I was cutting out two identical front and back pieces. Then I cut out the fins, 4 total pieces.

Next I cut out the eyes. I used my nested mixing bowls for this. Any time I need a circle I use them to find the right size. I picked out 2 sized bowls, traced them on to the felt using a pencil. 2 big white circles and 2 black smaller circles.

Finally I took what felt I had left to make the tentacles. I had a piece that was basically 1 yard by 1 yard (37 inches x 38 inches) so I divided 38 by 8. Because a Colossal Squid has 8 tentacles. That gave me 4.75 inches per tentacle. I was hoping for 6 or 7 inches but I worked with what I had. Patricks waist to floor height was 26 inches so I trimmed off 11 inches. So if your child is taller you would still have plenty! (Patrick is 50 inches tall and wears 7/8 boys clothing) use your yard stick to mark out 4.75 inches on one side and then do the same on the opposite parallel side. The use your yard stick and pencil make a line from the dot on one side to the dot on the other for perfectly straight lines. Then cut them out.

Now that everything is cut out start sewing. I started with the two top fins. I sewed the two pieces together but left a 2 inch gap so that I could stuff them with Poly-Fil. After I stuffed it I machine sewed up that 2 inch gap. Then I did the same to the other. I did not bother turning it right sides out because it looked cute with the sharper edges. But when it came to the body I did not want the seems to be that way. This next part gets a little more technical. Take you 2 fins you have already stuffed and lay them on one of the 2 body pieces. You are going to sew them on that one piece. Then put the other body piece on top. This sandwiches the fins on the inside of the costume. Sew all sides except the bottom. Now turn the costume inside out and now you seams are on the inside and your fins are on the outside. Patrick said it was like magic!

Next I put the costume on him to determine where to put the face and arm holes. I used a pencil to mark where his face was and where his arms should go. Then took it off of him. I used a nested mixing bowl to draw a circle for the face and cut it out. Then I used my seam ripper to rip the seams where his arms go. Then I turned the costume inside out to reinforces the seams so that they do not rip further.

Now on to the eyes.

I sewed the black circle on the white circle. I left a 2 inch opening so I could stuff the black circle. Then I sewed up the 2 inches. And did the same on the other eye. Next I sewed the eyes on to the head. I pinned the eyes on and put the sewing machine through the face hole so I could reach the eye. This got tricky at points but I went slowly. I left a 2 inch opening again to stuff the eye. The did the same on the other side.

Next the tentacles. I folded all the strips in half and rounded the bottom using the smallest nested mixing bowl and cut. When I sewed the rounded bottom and side leaving the top open so I could stuff it. Now since this fabric was only 4.75 inches wide it is too narrow to turn inside out to hide seams. So like the fins I left the seams out. After all 8 were sewn I stuffed them. I used the handle of my Swiffer map to push down the stuffing to the bottom. Then sewed up the open top.

Next I sewed the tentacles to the body. I pinned 1 tentacle every 2 inches all the way around. And then sewed them on. Finally I hot glued 6 pompoms per tentacle. And there it is a Colossal Squid!