My First Real Sewing Project

When I first asked Kai what he wanted to be for Halloween, it was Superman, then it was a bird, then a nest(?), then a few other things, but when he came up with Super Why, he wasn't budging. That was it, he wanted to be Super Why from the PBS kids' show of the same name. Of course this is the first season of Super Why, I've seen the same 5 episodes over and over again since the near end of September, so there are no costumes or patterns for sale. Perfect. Actually, it kind of was. Except for my lack of sewing experience and little ability, it was a great opportunity to make the costume just the way I wanted it to be. So off to fabric stores I went during their frequent fleece sales and I picked up a few yards of what I needed, thread, supplies, etc. I had a few store employees ask me what I was making and everytime...

Me: Just making a costume.

Them: Oh! What is it going to be?

Me: Super Why

Them: Super Who? (or) Super What?

I had to explain maybe 5 times who Super Why was and that was just while buying fabric. I was wondering if it would even be worth the effort to put this costume together if no one would have a clue of who he was, but I was hoping for the best and knew Kai would be happy, so I got to work.

After a lot of measuring, making my own patterns based off pajamas, underwear and my imagination, figuring out how to make the costume perfect despite the fact my kid isn't a cartoon character with a watermelon-sized head and trying to make the whole thing work for a 3 year-old, this is what I came up with: A costume that looked perfect enough (even for me)and it was warm enough that it was perfect for trick or treating (although we lucked out with nice weather. We could barely squeeze thin cotton jammies underneath) And a few pre-schoolers actually knew who Kai was supposed to be! We only had one person answer the door, ask who he was dressed as and then reply with, "Super Who?" Otherwise he got some compliments and we heard a bunch of little ones shouting to their parents, "Hey look! It's Super Why!" But there was candy to be had, so Kai was fairly oblivious to all that.


So here it is, the final product. This was actually the first time he had everything on at once, just before we went out to trick or treat, so I'm lucky it worked...














A close-up of the emblem



A close-up of the attached cape. It is threaded with a cord-type thing I made at the top and then the cord is attached with snaps in the shoulders. The snaps on the ends of the cord snap together so that when I took the cape off, I wouldn't lose the cord in the cape. Clever, eh? :) And it was nice we could take the thing off without it having to tie around his neck.

One very posed shot. He thought he was hot stuff. :)

A few notes: The whole thing looked a bit odd since I wasn't really planning well for clothes underneath. We could barely get the sleeves of the top on, but we did it. Other than that though, it worked out great! And fleece rocks for a first project, by the way. It's very forgiving and pretty easy to work with. I think I'll be making a few things for Zeke soon with the piles of fabric I have left. If you don't figure in what I have left, the actual supplies I used probably cost $10-15, maybe less. Very nice!