Halloween Project '12

I am resigning myself to the fact that Halloween costumes will never be simple as I anticipate they will be.

November 1, 2011- "Mom, I want to be a mummy next year for Halloween!"  Cool. A piece of cake.  FFM was consistent and told me for months (I guess some kids are planners and think about costumes year round) that he wanted to be a mummy.  End of summer arrives.  Suddenly the whole costume idea changes.  No more mummy, it's Jake the Pirate.  Now, if I have to manufacture any part of a costume I need a looooooooooooong lead time.  I am not a zippy seamstress. I need like weeks.  Or months.  Just in case it takes a try or two.  Or three.

Jake is a licensed Disney character.  Easy costume methinks! Simply order one from Disney and be done!  Even better, this summer a Disney store opened in our nearby mall.  Super.  I rang them up and asked 1) if they would be recieveing Jake costumes and 2) When they would arrive and 3)What sizes they would get.

Yes, they were in, and biggest was 5T.

Uh oh.  FFM hasn't been a 5T for a while. Now, it's a costume, so maybe I could squeeze him into it and not worry about it being too short if it got me out of constructing one from scratch.  Short OK.  Not going all the way around, whole 'nother ball of wax. grrrrrrrr

So the premade costume idea didn't pan out so I came home and googled and checked Pinterest for ideas.  I am not alone.  The vast knowledge of the internet yielded instructions for a homemade costume.  I'm cobbling together several patterns, mainly with the help of this one from Between the Toys and another from Lu Bird Baby.

My mission, now that I have chosen to accept it, is to turn this:

into this:

Note: Mr. Detail pointed out that the shiny gray fabric we picked is NOT the right color but it passed his approval anyway.