Hello everyone! This one took months to complete, and I’m thrilled with how it turned out. I have to admit I actually made this one a while ago but I was going through a lot at the time so I never posted it. However, I’m happy to post it today. If you follow me on Youtube then you’ve seen some of my videos about making this cosplay. This required a lot of fur and especially of different types. I ended up purchasing it at Hobby Lobby. For one thing they were half the price of Joanne Fabrics (yes this was before they closed) but I could also wait until the fabric was on sale and so I ended up getting it for a great price. If you would like a step-by-step of how I made everything, I highly recommend you check out my YouTube channel. For now let’s take a look at how it turned out.
The hardest part of this cosplay was all of the spikes on the skirt. Each of them had to be 3D printed and painted individually. I also had my battle axe, which is not shown here. However, I did also crochet a big and a small dragon to really give it the how to train your dragon vibe. There is a wire in both of them, so that you can adjust the wings or wrap the smaller dragon around the wrist.
If you would like some help planning a cosplay, let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
Hello Everyone I hope that you have enjoyed Mario Day this year and were able to take advantage of the great sales that Nintendo was having. I know I’m a couple of weeks late but I wanted to share with you this Toadette cosplay I made in January of this year. It was so much fun to make and it was a bit out of my comfort zone. For a while, I have really wanted to buy a hat that looked like a mushroom that was really popular last year or two years ago. Like with most things I was way behind the trend and by the time I knew about it, the fad had died down. My cottagecore vibes though could not stop thinking about making a mushroom hat so I decided to give it a try. What I love most about this project is I was able to use leftover packaging and things that were just going to be thrown away and given new life. Here is my Mario Day post featuring this super fun hat.
With this cosplay, I decided to challenge myself to make this as budget-friendly as I could. If you can believe it, I only spent about $20 on this one. The majority of it went into the wig. The pink dress under the vest was one that I already had in my closet and the vest fabric I found at Walmart for $3+ a yard and I reused some gold ribbon I already had. If you would like to see some of the process of making this costume please be sure to check out my Instagram.
Hello Everyone! So I’m really excited about this post today. So I was in a thrift store a couple of weeks and saw this beautiful tablecloth. It was green and had a beautiful lace style with some leaves throughout the design. The moment I saw it, I knew I needed to make a Tinkerbell cosplay. So I bought it and then purchased some satin fabric to go behind it since it was see-through. I sat on it for a couple of weeks trying to decide how I wanted to go about and make it. One weekend I decided I was going to just take the leap and attempt it.
I started out by using sewist.com to design the pattern. If you would like a full review on the website you can check out my other blog post here. I did take some creative licenses with the design. First I started off by adding some spaghetti straps. I didn’t want to add boning to the bodice and I wanted to make sure that it would be able to stay up. Secondly, I made the length of the dress longer. I wasn’t comfortable with the length of the original design so I made it knee-length in the hope that I would also be able to wear it for other occasions as well.
Once I had the pattern designed I purchased it, printed it out, and cut out the pieces. I was really excited about it and I started with the skirt pieces and cut the green lining. I wanted to make sure that they would fit before cutting out the tablecloth. Once I finished that I started cutting the pieces out of the tablecloth and sewed them together and serging the edges to get them neat and clean. Then I started working on the top. This was slightly more difficult but I found it easier to baste the lace pieces to the satin so that I can keep a nice crisp seam. I ironed after every step to make that a bit easier. For a closure on the back, I added a zipper for convenience. When it was all done I did the bottom hem. When I created the original design I used a straight hem on the bottom. This gave me the flexibility to decide how I wanted the bottom. I folded it in fourths and used a 3.5 in measurement to make the edges. A little photoshoot in my office and some photo pixie dust and voila, I present some of my favorite images. If you have any questions let me know down below!
Happy Star Wars Day! May the 4th be with you! I’m so excited to be back with another post for Star Wars Day. This is a dress that I have dreamed about owning since Star Wars: Attack of the Clones came out. Let’s be honest, all of Padme’s dresses are amazing but this one has always had a special place in my heart. I honestly thought that I would never own this dress. Then one night at 3 am it suddenly occurred to me, I know how to sew now! I can make the dress! Needless to say, the hyper fixation began that night. I ran into a lot of issues along the way but was able to tackle them one at a time. I started out with the McCall’s 3797 Renaissance Costume Dress Pattern. This pattern gave me the sleeves and everything that I needed. Unfortunately, I was not able to find any fabric that had the embroidery that I needed on it already. So after I cut out the pieces I had to embroider the entire thing by hand. It took close to 150 hours for just the chiffon part. Though it was a lot more work it was definitely worth it. Here is what it looked like when everything was put together and embroidered.
Of course, the sleeves are actually off the shoulder but I was not able to get it to stay up my mannequin that way. I added an invisible zipper to the back to make it easier to get on. For the sleeves, I added rose buttons to keep them closed and match the shawl.
For the shawl, I used a curtain that already had rose embroidery. It was in a white color though and I needed it to be yellow. So I used some of the Rit Dye for synthetics. In the end, I only died it for about 3-5 minutes and it turned out beautifully. I embroidered the scallop edging using my sewing machine to finish it off.
The biggest problem that I found was that I couldn’t find a corset that I liked and would work with the costume. I had never made one before so though I didn’t know what I was doing I decided to try to draft one myself. So I did what all of the best youtube videos said, wrapped myself in duct tape! You can enjoy my rather embarrassing photo below. I drew out on the tape where I wanted everything to be and then cut out the pieces and traced them to paper. The hardest part was the embroidery. I was able to get a custom order from an etsy shop with the hand embroidery guide. I use a water-soluble stabilizer that I had left over and used a Sharpie marker to trace it on. Then got to work. For the roses, I cut out the ones on the left over fabric from the shawl and glued them on. I added the grommets and was done after adding the boning to the lining.
Then I finished the look by crocheting the bun covers out of gold crochet thread. I made a butterfly pin using polymer clay and used some filler diamonds from Dollar Tree for the jewels. To finish off the look, I bought a brown curly wig from amazon and gold shoes. Hers was a square toe and I was able to find a comfortable pair for a good price.
To finish off this post, I’m going to share with you some of the finished pictures. Be sure to let me know what you think in the comments and if you have any questions about the process, please be sure to let me know. May the Force Be With You!
Hello, my friends! I’m so excited to be back with you to share another Cosplay adventure. So we went to our local comic con not too long ago and my husband wanted to go as Master Roshi. This is only the second costume that I have made for him so I was a bit concerned in addition to trying to get my own costume done to enter the competition. However, I absolutely love how this turned out. If you are interested in learning a bit more about how I did this then please keep reading. Since my costume was taking must longer than expected, don’t worry I’ll make a post about that one later, we needed to pick a costume that we knew for sure we could have time for. Though my husband loves to dream big, as I do, we had to be realistic and this seemed like the perfect option. He already had the shorts and flip-flops as part of his regular wardrobe so the only real thing for me to make was the shell and shirt. The accessories like the staff and facial hair we were able to buy from Amazon, fortunately.
The Shirt
I started with the shirt because I had never made a men’s button-up shirt before and it was kind of intimidating especially with the collar. I was able to find a sewing pattern on Etsy, you can find it here. The price was great and my husband wears button-ups several times a week so I thought this would be great to make summer shirts that he can wear any time. We were on a tight budget so after looking at several different fabric options, I opted for an orange 100% cotton fabric from our local Walmart. I spent and afternoon and evening making the shirt only then to realize it was too small. I was completely defeated because I then had to reprint the pattern, tape all of the pieces together once again, cut the pattern pieces out, and then cut the fabric. I will admit, I did procrastinate a little bit because of my ADHD because it was completely overwhelming to me. Thank goodness for talking to my amazing cousin on the phone as it helped me get it done. So after I went and bought more fabric from Walmart I started again. Since Master Roshi’s shirt is supposed to be loose anyway I decided to just go with the biggest size thinking that if needed I could just take it in later. As it ended up I didn’t have to do that and it worked perfectly. When the shirt was done it looked something like this:
I then used my Cricut to cut out some purple triangles and black letters. I was really fortunate with how Design Space put the triangles as I was able to use not only the ones that I added but also the “negative space” triangles so I didn’t have to cut more. As it ended up with the letters, I needed two cut 1 1/2 sets of the alphabet to cover the entire shirt. I bought some 5/8 white buttons from Hobby Lobby and used the setting on my machine to do the buttonhole.
The Shell
I’m not going to lie, the shell caused me severe anxiety. I had never made anything this big with foam and I was so scared that I was going to ruin it. I only had a month so if something went sideways I did not have a chance to Fix it. I started out trying to find a pattern. I searched the internet trying to find something that I could use. Eventually, I found a EVA foam shell on Etsy for a Mario Cosplay, you can find it here. I bought it quickly and taped the pieces together then cut it out. I quickly realized that this was not going to work for my over 6′ husband as it’s made more for a child or teenager. I started to panic and messaged the seller and she told me how I could adjust the size. With my dad’s help and his handy dandy compass drawing tool, we added 4 inches all the way around and it worked perfectly. The cosplay foam was pretty expensive and since it isn’t Halloween they didn’t carry it at the majority of the craft stores in the area. So for this one, we actually opted for the foam floor mats from Harbor Freight. We used the Weldwood Contact Cement to glue the panels together and traced out altered pattern on the foam and cut it out. (I took inspiration from the video found here for the main construction and top details)This time I wanted to try one of those breakaway blade knives to cut the foam. When making my Ahsoka Tano cosplay I used an X-Acto knife and it was a pain to keep changing the blades. This stuff was much thicker as well and I like that I could adjust it to make the blade long enough to cut in one pass. I glued the darts shut and we had a shell! I bought a white foam dowel rod and cut it in half to use as trim.
After that, I covered it in painter’s tape. Lesson learned…..if you are doing something this big, use tape that is at least 2.5 inches wide otherwise you will use a whole bunch of tape and get little accomplished. I wanted my husband to be able to participate in this and so I had him draw the lines of how he wanted the raised parts of the shell. Afterward, I cut them and unstuck them from the shell and used the left over foam from the mats to make them. For the areas that were really curved, I made single cuts to great a dart so that they would lay flat on the foam. I then started to glue them to the shell. It took me a morning and afternoon to do all of this with plenty of breaks as I was also sanding the edges to get a rounded and more natural look and the smell of the glue got to me a couple of times. I let it completely cure then I hit it with the heat gun to seal the foam. Now it was time to seal it again. Admittedly what I used, I would never use again but I bought a can of flex seal rubber sealer for roofs and figured I would just paint it on. For the Ahsoka costume, I used a spray but it’s winter time and we kept getting snow or rain and I thought it would add texture. Well… it was a pair to work with and this stuff took 3 days to fully cure. It was also incredibly thick and liked to run, but hey that’s even more texture, right? When that was finally all done and cured it was time to paint. I used some of the Flexible FX paint in purple at Hobby Lobby. It just so happened to be on clearance for 86 cents so that was a major win. I mixed it with some black FX paint I had left over and painted it in between the raised parts of the shell and on the edges. After that dried, I took the straight purple and put blended it around the edges, and applied it to the middle. Then mixed the purple with some white to get a lighter shade and use a natural sponge to apply it to the very center or the parts that stuck out for highlights.
The last part I had to worry about was how we were going to make it wearable. This was difficult because I wanted something he could take off for panels easily and if he dropped something I wanted it to have enough give to stretch. As it ended up we were able to upcycle some old dress suspenders and hot glued them to the inside. This allowed the straps to even be adjustable and comfortable all day.
So that’s pretty much it for this costume. He loved it and got so many pictures with different people and those Dragon Ball Z cosplays and best of all it was comfortable and affordable. If you have any questions don’t be afraid to let me know! Thanks for joining me today!
Hello and thank you for joining me again for another cosplaying adventure. From the moment that the last Comic-Con was over, I knew the next one that I wanted to do. While I had originally planned to take it slow, I learned that once I get excited about something I can’t stop and even found another convention to attend exactly one month after the first one. Let me tell you this was a crazy month and I had a lot of moments of frustration and tears but I absolutely love how it turned out.
I started with the headpiece because I knew that was one of the most important parts of the whole costume. This was only the second cosplay I had ever made and NEVER have I used foam so this was going to be interesting. I was able to find this pattern on Etsy for the Lekku (Click Here to be taken to the pattern) I tried a variety of different adhesives on the 3mm in an attempt to find one that would actually work. In the end, I used Weldwood Rubber Cement. Something that I look is most important with this is to apply a THIN layer then you want to let it dry for a couple of minutes. It should not look wet. You can use a heat gun to bend the foam to get it to the shape that you need. A video tutorial on Youtube provided by the seller helps to show you how to put it together. Please note that it can only be printed on A4 paper so if you are in the US you’ll have to buy special paper.
After you finish putting it together, you need to seal it with your heat gun. This will close the particles and help to make sure it doesn’t melt or get deformed when painting. The foam will be shiny when it is properly sealed. Next, I highly recommend sealing it again, some recommend Plasti Dip though I used a spray rubber by Gorilla. Personally, I used the white color so that I could make sure that everything was covered and sealed properly. I let it cure for the full 24 hours before painting. For the paint, I used Plaid FX Flexible acrylic paint in a couple of different blue colors to add depth to the piece.
For the armor, I purchased the pattern from the same seller HERE. It came with no instructions but was able to figure it out. Eventually. Please note that I am a size XL and the belt part I had to adjust because it was not long enough to go around. After everything was put together I sprayed it also with the spray rubbed and painted it. For the silver parts I was running out of time and opted to pair it with spray paint with a hammered metal texture. For everything except the belt, I added elastic straps. To keep it secured I sewed a piece of nylon webbing (or straping) and then hot glued it to the back of the piece. For the belt, I hot-glued the buckle to one of the sides and then put velcro to hold the other end of the buckle to the other end of the belt. However, I was worried it would randomly fall off so I bought some parachute clips from amazon and attached elastic to each one, and put it on the inside of the belt so that it would have doubt security but still stay hidden.
Last but not least is the dress. I purchased this pattern from Etsy HERE. Admittedly at first I was worried because there are no sewing instructions what’s so ever. However, it is a pretty easy sew. I started with the shoulder seams and then the side seams. I trimmed the extra from the seam allowance and clipped the curves in the side seams. Since I have a bigger chest, it didn’t fit quite right there so I added a couple of darts that fixed the problem. For the silver details, I traced the guides on my computer and had my Cricut cut everything out of silver HTV and then applied it with my Cricut Easy Press Mini.
I finished off the look with a $5 pair of navy blue leggings from Walmart and some tall boots that I used that I already had.
Hello everyone! I’m so excited to share with you the first-ever cosplay that I made! I am still new to sewing (only being learning to make clothes for maybe 6 months or so) However, after over 2 years without a vacation due to COVID, we decided to do a mini weekend getaway and go to our first official comic con near us. We of course didn’t decide that we were going to do this until the last minute so I had to pull everything together in 5 days. It was a struggle for sure with trying to work and make this costume but it turned out so well that I have to share it with you.
If you have not had to the chance to play Monster Hunters Stories 2: Wings of Ruin for the Nintendo Switch I highly recommend it. It has a great storyline and the action is not too intense. It’s an open-world adventure that is so relaxing as you can explore and the character customization is top notch. One of the characters that travel with you is Ena.
So first off one of the most important things for this character is the jacket. This is ultimately what took the most time. I was able to find this pattern on Etsy and I highly recommend it. What I loved about the pattern is that it has not only the jacket pattern but also the dress, bracers, belt, and pauldrons. I also loved that the price was so reasonable. I also found the seller was extremely helpful and willing to answer all of my cosplay newbie questions. When it came to the fabric for the jacket I had a hard time trying to figure out what to use. I get overheated very easily and was worried that in a busy convention center this was going to be an issue, especially since it had a lining. I finally decided on this linen blend on Amazon and purchased the green color. (For fabric listing click here) For the inside lining, I just went to my local JoAnn Fabrics and bought a basic white cotton fabric.
For the dress I didn’t have enough time to actually sew it so I went to Walmart and purchased a short-sleeved shirt that was 4 sizes bigger so that it would have the right length. I cut out the details for the dress and hood of the jacket with the included SVG files on my Cricut and then ironed them on.
For the belt, bracers, and pauldrons I used a microsuede fabric in Chocolate on Amazon (you can find it here) For the scales on the pauldrons I purchased some silver rolls of faux leather from Hobby Lobby and had my Cricut cut that out as well so that they would be even and then hot glued them on.
The accessories were what really finished it off. In the listing for the pattern, they recommended someone who had the 3D print files for all the accessories. Needless to say, I purchased those and 3D printed them and hot glued them on or hot glued to a broach pin to easily take it on and off. (Click Here for the link to the 3D print files.)
I finished off the outfit with a pair of shorts and a pair of tall boots that I already had as well.
Cats MeWOW Designs 