Cheshire Cat Costume

As I mentioned earlier, my daughter is going to be the Cheshire Cat from Alice in Wonderland for Halloween this year. She was really excited at the idea– so excited that when the yard of fabric I’d ordered– pink and purple striped faux fur– arrived, she used it as a blanket on her bed until I was ready to sew!

Once I finally pried the fabric out of her hands, the actual costume construction took no time at all. First I made a tail by the simple expedient of cutting a tapered shape out of a folded-over piece of the fur fabric.

I just sewed up the open side and turned it right-side out, though in order to make things easier on my machine I trimmed back the fur at the seam allowance with my shears. It also helps keep the seam neater.

Once I’d made the tail, I realized that it would be difficult to attach to the striped dress she was going to wear as the base for her costume– just sewing it on would stretch out the knit dress, but if I put it on a belt, the belt would stand out too much. Having a ton of fur fabric left over and figuring that extra warmth was better anyway, I decided to make a simple vest for her to wear over the dress, that I could attach the tail to.

I cut out a basic vest shape, then sewed up the sides. Luckily for me, the fabric didn’t fray at all, so no edge finishing was necessary.

Once the vest was sewn I just attached the tail to the back with large stitches.

The ears were also very easy–I  cut out two trapezoids from the fabric (I trimmed down the fur significantly on the entire surface to make it easier to work with), and cut slits in the edges to make tabs. Then I folded the tabs inwards and hand-stitched them down to make a finished edge.

I cut out triangles of pink felt and hot-glued them over the top, covering the raw edges of the fur. Then I hot-glued and sewed the finished ears to a plain black headband.

 

I completed the costume with the aforementioned striped dress, worn over a purple shirt and fleece-lined tights. She loved it!