It’s all her fault~Disney World Costumes

I grew up singing/memorizing ever Disney movie I could watch. It was my fantasy release from a not so normal/magical childhood. Fast forward to being married with two kids of my own. My son was all about Lightning McQueen since he was a baby and loved Disney movies as well, but it still never occurred to us to take him to Disney World.  Then  I had a daughter, and when she turned 5 and (finally) wanted to dress as a Princess I went a little ( WAY) overboard on costumes and trip planning.

You see it was going to be our first ever Walt Disney World trip. I don’t know why I put it off for so long. Maybe I knew it was going to be an addiction, maybe I was just too scared to plan it unless I knew I could do it right. I think it all worked out well in the end, but along the way  I wasn’t so sure…

There is a website that will steal every spare minute of your time and fill your head with endless ideas, plans and dreams…it’s called Pinterest and it needs its own support group. I was compiling ideas in my head of what we would all wear on our magical dream trip (because at the time that was more important than anything else). I came up with idea that my daughter would wear her daily uniform (leggings, tutu and t-shirt) but make each on character themed. I started with Rapunzel as it was her favorite at the time. Purple leggings, tutu and a top with pink ribbons. Simple right? Then my creative ADD brain started thinking… maybe I could add puff sleeves with pink strips so it looks more like the costume? The crew neckline is okay, but it would be better to add the lace trim and maybe square the neckline? Hmmm maybe just add a different colored fabric behind the ribbons? 

 

Do you see what happened there? I somehow convinced myself that I could make a movie replica bodice top from a t-shirt….I need help. So after I committed in my head to making this very complicated top I came the conclusion that I couldn’t go through all that trouble on a top and then just have leggings and tutu…it wouldn’t do the top justice. So how hard would be to make a skirt to match? Oh, and the wig…because my daughter’s hair is barely chin length so she has to wear some king of hair extensions I can braid in and add flowers on clips…but then the crown… the only crowns I found online were cheap plastic things that looked nothing like the movie version and the ones on Etsy cost a fortune… how hard would it be to make one of those?

So my simple, easy t-shirt and tutu idea morphed into a full on Cosplay costume, complete with corset bodice top, wig and crown.

The only problem is… I CAN’T SEW. No really. I can’t. I didn’t even own a sewing machine. I went to Walmart and purchased one for about $75 (the cheapest one there). I also bought a lot of ‘no-sew’ tape and hot glue.  I spent hours learning how to thread the machine and how to wind a bobbin (Thank you YOUTUBE). I eventually gave up and bought a bobbin winder thingy ma-bob. I also found out really quickly that there wasn’t a pattern for a Rapunzel costume (at least not one that I wanted to make) so I had to make one up. After some more research on Pinterest I came up with making a dummy off my daughter using duck tape. This helped me be able to draw out some shapes to make the pattern. Are you seeing a trend here? I am the epitome of “give a mouse a muffin”, or rather “give Tamara a trip to Disney.”

Then came the 5 bodice disaster, lesson learned part. Yes I ended up making and ruining 5 different tops before I figured out bobbin tension, how to sew a lining and how to sew right sides together, oh and what a seam allowance was. Apparently sizing is all depended upon seam allowances (I am still learning this part). Then came the evils of learning invisible zippers (mine are still not invisible but I’ve come to learn to accept that).

Then came time to grommet for the corset ribbons. I didn’t put any boning in the top because, well, I couldn’t figure out how to do that and I was afraid to ruin what I already (miraculously) put together. I still wish I had put a thicker piece of interfacing along the edge so that the grommets wouldn’t pop out so easily and YES you do need to buy that $12.99 grommet tool thingy-ma-bob as the whole hammer thing will fail horribly~trust me.

Then came the agonizing, finger poking job of hand sewing pink pipping and white lace all around the edges. I watched so many youtube tutorials about whip stitches and yet it still looked like crap. Oh well, at least I used clear fishing line thread.  I went through 3 different puff sleeve attempts before I had some usable pieces and I chickened out and used no-sew tape to put the pink ribbon pieces on as I can’t sew a straight line to save my life. When I finally got the top put together I about cried with relief and tried to not focus on the mistakes (which made me want to start over and make a new one).-Perfectionist much?

Don’t look at the fact that the bodice is a plain purple linen material and it doesn’t have the hand painted flourishes that Rapunzel’s has in the movie…I tried to make a stencil to later hand paint the design on but gave up after several failed attempts. I couldn’t replicate her skirt design either, but found a stencil that was similar enough and spent a morning painting that on.

Then came her crown. After lots research I bought a Cricut machine (best idea ever). I was able to tweak her crown template in photoshop to get it the shape and style I wanted, then run it through the machine to cut out in thick cardstock several copies. I then used jewelry wire hot glued down to make it stronger and then spent several painstaking hours bedazzling the heck out of it with Swarovski crystals. I found the big crystals at Michaels as pendants for other necklaces.

Remember how I thought I could just add a few hair extension pieces to make her braid? Ha ha ha…nope. I started with Disney’s child Rapunzel wig (so I knew it would fit her head) then used cotton batting and another wig cut up and sewn together to make the little braids and then hot glued it all together and added the flowers.

I was so excited to have my daughter try it all on and sew it FINALLY put together. (please excuse the poor quality cell phone photos).

After all was said and done I could have saved money, time and my sanity just hiring a professional seamstress to do this (seriously), but in the end I get the pride of saying yes that costume is mine. All of the imperfections are memories, lessons and my daughter was part of the process.

Watching her walk through Fantasy Land as Rapunzel and seeing her light up, pose for pictures and then dance around Rapunzel’s tower was worth every second. I tear up looking at these images and remembering that day, that moment.

So you see there is a reason behind my Disney obsession, OCD planning and crazy creative ADD. Its all her fault.

 

 

 

Oh wait, did I fail to mention that this costume was one of 6 I made for this trip? Ariel, Tinkerbell, Aurora, and Belle all were represented that trip and my son was Jack Sparrow, Gaston, Jedi  and Peter Pan.