sewing advice needed for a kids costume

[janie1234]

Hello fellow costume sewers. I need some help. My daughter wants to be princess peach from Super Mario Brothers. I've made this much of the costume so far but I need help with the collar and the gem in the middle. I found this cheapy earing thing at Target this morning and thought it might work well for the gem on the bodice but I can't think of ways to get one, . .the gold rim around the gem and two how to get it to stay in place, . .worried glue might not cut it. Also for the collar I'm worried that it will be to bulky and not stand up. I have to draft the pattern from scratch so that bugs me a bit too. I hate sewing curves. Well here is a pic of princess peach if it will help.
http://toadscastle.net/images/250px-Peach_SPP.jpg
She does not have pierced ears, . . so I'm going to have to find some sort of clip on backs and make my own, . . . Halloween is just around the corner!!

 

[SheWolf]

I have purchased big oval gem stones like you are looking for at my local AC Moore crafts store. Now mine I needed to attach to a necklace, so at the same craft store I bought a pre-cut oval of wood that was slightly larger and painted gold then glued the gem on. From there if you think the glue won't hold it to the fabric you could drill a few small holes around teh edge of teh wood and sew it to the dress like a button, in a sense. HTH!

 

[CinLou]

For the gold rim around the gem, I would applique a piece of shiny gold fabric. For the gem, I would use stick on velcro or double stick carpet tape. It is pretty strong.
For the collar, I would gather a doubled piece of the pink fabric so that it would stand up and stitch it to the dress neckline. If you have a serger, you could roll hem the two pieces of fabric together before gathering them. Good luck with your costume. It is cute.

 

[spyrosmom]

I have no sewing suggestions whatsoever, but I wanted to say what a cute costume idea. I'm a bit of a Mario-head, and I've seen many princesses at Halloween, but never Mario's princess. The dress is spot-on, too. Cute!

Nan

 

[Sunshine1528]

Ahhhh yes, costumes. My kids did theater and creativity is definitely needed for these things.

ITA with attaching the gemstone to some fabric and tacking it to the dress or add a ring of gold trim (from the ribbon section of the fabric store) or a large gold piping and then tack.

For the collar the folded over "double" fabric gathered is a good idea but to help it stand up you could use some heavy interfacing. Should work just fine.

Very nice job on the dress ! ! ! Love it !

 

[janie1234]

Many thanks everyone. I'll experiment and see what works. I've searched high and low for an acrylic large flat back gem stone and I can't for the life of me find it, . . . and I thought you could find anything on the internet. I really wanted acrylic because it is lightweight. We're a bunch of Mario Fans. If I had time I would make myself a Princess Daisy costume but I've been spending all my time and money on the rest of the family. When I'm done I'll post some pics. Thanks again!

 

[SheWolf]

Janie,

I have a low acrylic royal blue gemstone that is 1 1/2" by about 1" oval. I would be happy to mail it to you if it would work. You can pm me if you want it.