Toad and Toadette Halloween

Things have been quiet on the blog lately since I've been busy getting our Halloween costumes done and then having fun wearing them out! Jon and I went as Toad and Toadette from the Mario Kart and Mario Party games and the costumes were really well received and super comfortable!! Jon wore his costume to work on Friday and wore the hat for 8 hours and it was great! I used some of the ideas I originally had, and ended up revising others. Since I had a lot of trouble finding helpful instructions, I'll give you details, but I won't be offended if you just scroll through the photos. If you have questions though, feel free to let me know!

The dress went fairly well considering that I hadn't made one before. I used Simplicity 2485 and extended the bust pattern piece by about an 1.25 inches so it wouldn't be completely inappropriate for my proportions. It worked fairly well but I had some issues working out the placement of the darts since I'm clearly more busty than the model... but in the end I was happy for the experience since I want to be able to make my own dresses and shirts since I have trouble with clothing off the rack. If you use this pattern, I would definitely lengthen it, it worked out fine with shorts underneath, but it is fairly short.





After looking around for a bunch of ideas on how to make Toad and Toadette hats and not finding many I liked, I decided to essentially make big pillows. I wished they had been smooth but this ended up being so easy for me, that I can't really complain. I made a hat using the pattern that came with the dress as a base (a store bought bucket hat would also probably work). I elongated the pieces so that the hat would be less of a beanie. To make the top, I cut a big circle (about 36" diameter) and basted around the edge. I pulled the threads on one side to gather the top, attached it to the hat and turned it right side out before stuffing it with polyfil. The circles are appliqued on my hand using Naptime Quilter's awesome circle technique since I didn't want to iron on over the gathered ripples.

For the pigtails I use the tutorial for cloth balls from Grand Revival. I used the biggest and smallest sizes. I was actually able to use fusible web to iron on the dots to the pigtails. I had no idea that would work as well as it did since I couldn't really press hard since the pigtails were basically pillows.






The vests were done by tracing the back of a t-shirt and cutting 2 of them. I cut one of those in half and sewed it together at the shoulders. I did the rest of the fitting by trying it on and eyeballing how to get it to look right. My vest has darts coming from the arm holes. The trim is satin blanket trim that I bought in a little package. I really didn't like working with it since it was really slippery and didn't have any give at all. You can't see it in the picture, but the trim actually gathers a bit behind the neck. If I were to do it again, I would use bias tape.





P.S. If you're looking for other ideas to make these hats, popular ideas seem to include
- paper mache (which is really heavy)
- sombrero with bubble wrap and fabric over the top
- half inflated beach ball with fabric over the top
- egg crate foam to create structure inside the hat