i'm gonna wreck it!

This is the premise of the video game, Fix-It Felix Jr.: 

Ralph owns some land. Citing Imminent Domain, the Nicelanders forcibly move Ralph from his land and into a garbage dump in order to build an apartment building. Ralph objects. He gets angry and vows to tear down the building, but everything he breaks, Fix-It Felix Jr. fixes with his dad's magic golden hammer.

Good guy?

So really, Wreck-It Ralph is the underdog. The premise of the movie, Wreck-It Ralph (upon which we designed our costumes this year) is that Ralph gets tired of not being appreciated for doing his job for thirty years. Felix gets all the medals and friendship; Ralph still lives friendless in the dump. So he ventures out into the hub to find a video game in which he can win a medal of his own . . . and the respect of the Nicelanders. 

The Mr. was Wreck-It Ralph this year, to go alongside the kiddo's Fix-It Felix.

We spiked his hair with some red Spirit Gel by Zach's Wax. It has really good hold, and doesn't smear if you hit it with a hair dryer before going out.

The shirt is a burnt orange polo shirt from Value Village ($3) with the collar removed and the cuffs torn to match the movie. I painted on the plaid pattern by blocking off horizontal stripes with masking tape and spraying with watered-down brick red acrylic paint (this worked a ton better than that crappy fabric spray I tried on my leggings awhile back).

Once those were dry, I drew in the blue lines using a Crayola fabric marker, then masked off the vertical stripes. I sprayed those with watered-down white acrylic paint, applied thinly enough that the other colors still show through where the colors overlap. We were all pretty pleased with how close it matched Ralph's "real" shirt.

I made the overalls using four yards of flannel and some white thread.

I used a pair of the Mr.'s jeans for a pattern for the bottom, adding a couple of inches to the side of each piece of fabric before cutting. Then I referred to a pair of my kiddo's overalls to determine the shape of the bibs, pockets, and straps and all the lines of stitching. 

Some metal overall hardware finished them off. Total cost of the overalls was $12.50 with fabric store coupons. 

I thought ahead and bought the orange flip-flops in August on clearance. Ralph usually goes barefoot, but Ralph's a cartoon. Real-world peeps wear shoes in October in the PNW.

We also bought a pair of Disney-licensed Wreck-It Ralph Wrecking Fists, but they were a little tight and hard to work in, so they got left behind on Halloween (although they did make an appearance at the preschool party). Don't worry; we bought them on clearance over the summer, so it wasn't as big a waste as if we'd paid what they're going for now on eBay.

I'm hoping to have a photo of the three of us to share soon; I actually finished my Vanellope costume in time, so I'll be going over that in a future post.

Happy November, everyone, and thanks for reading! I hope your Halloween was a smashing success. Pun intended.

(p.s. you can make these photos larger just by clicking on them, but you probably already knew that, clever you.)

altering adult-sized gloves for kids' halloween costumes

For the gloves for my kiddo's Fix-It Felix costume, I came up with several options.

Felix's gloves are solid tan in color, probably meant to mimic this pair, made of pig skin. I didn't order them because (a) they're too big; (b) locally, I found a pair but they cost $21; and (c) my aunt used to have a pet pig. He was really smart.

I searched for alternatives, and eventually found a pair of plain-colored cotton canvas work gloves at the thrift store for 99 cents. Dyed (with a combo of Dylon's Sunflower and Terra Cotta colors), they came out pretty close to the color I wanted. Still too large, but at least close to the right color.

But then I happened upon a pair of flannel work gloves that were even closer in color, except for the cuff.  They were also softer and more pliable, so I went for it. Note: this photo was taken after the fingers had already been shortened, as explained in the next step.

To shorten the fingers of adult-sized gloves: first turn them inside-out, then try them on the person meant to wear them. Mark where the fingers will end on the new-and-improved version (leaving a little room for the seam allowance) then stitch, cut off the excess fabric, and turn right-side out.

Next, remove the non-matching cuff by pulling out the stitches with a seam ripper.

Zig-zag the raw edge, then give it a very narrow hem.

Finish the glove with a band of 1/4-inch elastic stitched in place about an inch from the new hem.

And you're finished! Below is a photo of the finished gloves on my fully-costumed kiddo, holding Felix's gold hammer. (You can also see a bit of the tool belt, which I'll be talking about in the final Fix-It Felix blog post tomorrow.)

This will work on any gloves made of woven cloth. You may even have good success on gloves made of knit fabric, if you zig-zag the ends of the fingers to prevent them from unraveling. Leather, though, might be trickier, depending on the thickness and stiffness of the leather.

Tomorrow will be the last in this series, featuring the tool belt, pants, and boots, so come on back if you're trying to finish up a Fix-It Felix costume of your own by the time the weekend is over!

Need to find the other costume tutorials fast? Click here for the shirt and name patch, here for the magical golden hammer, and here for the cap and double-f patch.

Thanks for reading!

fix it? oh yeah. like three or four times.

If you've been following along, you may have already seen the tutorials for my kiddo's Fix-it Felix hat and golden hammer. Today, we come to a project that had a couple of false starts. It is, so far, the part of his costume that has required the most fixing.

 

Yes, the name patch. I started, as with the cap patch, by trying to use my machine's zig-zag stitch to "embroider" the name onto the Friendly Felt oval patch (having traced it on there with chalk). No dice. It looked pretty terrible. You don't get to have a photo.

I picked out the stitches and started over by hand, carefully satin stitching every letter. It took me a couple of hours to get it fairly perfect. 

The reason you don't get a photo of that patch is that I decided to iron it before photographing. The iron was too hot. The patch melted to the iron in about 1.5 seconds, and by the time I was able to scrape it loose, it was a blackened jumble of melted plastic (Friendly Felt is made of recycled pop bottles; the polyester setting, not the cotton, is as high as your iron should go when working with this stuff).

All I could do was laugh (maybe a little maniacally), wait a day, and start over.

Now that we've discussed what NOT to do, we can discuss what worked for me in the end. I cut an oval of the blue, stiffened Friendly Felt. Copying the look of Brush Script, I wrote the name "Felix" onto the felt using a washable marker. After using a chain stitch to embroider the name onto the felt using two strands of embroidery floss, I tied off the end and started satin stitching again to see if I still liked it. 

Nope. Not this time. I pulled out the satin stitches and decided I actually liked the chain stitches better on their own. Which is nice for you, because if you're making one of these for your kiddo's shirt, the patch up to this point will take you less than an hour (mine took about 20 minutes, but I was highly motivated).

  

Again, I tried to rely on my sewing machine's zig-zag function to put a white border on the patch, but it was terrible so I cut it off, then backed the blue with a slightly larger oval of white un-stiffened felt and stitched it in place with a line of white stitches. Bam. Done. 

Ooh! Let's take a minute to talk about the shirt, while we're at it! If you happen to have a short-sleeved light blue oxford laying around, you're golden. You can just stick your patch on there and you're done. 

After much searching, I found a shirt that almost fit the bill at a thrift store for $2 . . . except that it had long sleeves. But that's an easy fix.

I laid a short sleeve shirt on top to trace the angle of the sleeves, then hemmed them on the machine.

It didn't take long at all.

I don't use this Heat n' Bond stuff for a lot of things, but I have previously used it for the Legend of Zelda patches for the kiddo's second birthday party, and I use it to attach the vinyl ends of my measuring tape growth charts.

 

Just follow package directions to attach the adhesive to the back of the patch using an iron (remember: POLYESTER SETTING ONLY), then peel the paper and iron it onto your shirt (I found that ironing from the back works best for this step, so work from the inside of your shirt).

And here is is, after the patch was ironed onto the freshly ironed shirt, looking totally legit, especially when paired up with the cap. I took this last photo outdoors, so the actual colors of everything come through.

You folks out there with embroidery machines might giggle a little at how much effort went into this little piece of the costume; trust me, I'm right there with you. I used to work as a machine embroidery operator, so I know that it would take maybe ten minutes to program the "design" and stitch this up on a machine.

I'm kind of glad, really, that I get to show how those of us currently without expensive equipment (embroidery machines, Silhouette cutters, sergers) can still pull off projects with a limited budget. I had the Heat n' Bond and the white felt in my stash already and the blue Friendly Felt was leftover from the hat patch, so I've only invested $2.19 in this completed shirt (including the nineteen cents I paid at the thrift store for some white embroidery floss). That's pretty awesome, right?

Okay: you can check out my hat tutorial and hammer tutorial in previous posts. Still to come: the tool belt, the jeans, and the boots (hint: start hitting up thrift stores for the jeans and boots). If you're following along for Halloween 2013, no worries! I'll have addressed everything by the end of next week.

* Update: glove tutorial here, and tool belt, jeans, and boots post here.

Thanks for reading!

p.s. you can make these photos larger just by clicking on them, but you probably already knew that, clever you.

fix-it felix golden hammer

Because I won't hand a three-year-old a hammer spray-painted gold, I had to come up with another idea for the kiddo's Halloween costume hammer.

I could have used a regular toy hammer and spray painted that gold, but I thought something scaled a little more cartoonishly large would be fitting for Fix-It Felix.

I used a 90-cent piece of foam pipe insulation from the hardware store (it's sold in six-foot lengths), a piece of doweling that fit the space in the center, and some duct tape in regular and gold colors.

The handle is cut from an 18-inch piece, with an 8-inch top and two 1.5-inch pieces for the hammerhead.

I used an 18-inch dowel to connect the pieces.

The two pieces of the hammer head fit around the end.

Here's another photo to help illustrate how they fit (some trimming will be necessary to help them fit exactly).

 Then I trimmed the other end to make it look more like a hammer. The bits I cut off were used to fill the hollow spaces at the end of the handle and the hammerhead.

I secured all of the parts together with a layer of standard duct tape. Kids are kinda rough on stuff, so I made sure everything was extra sturdy.

Finally, a decorative layer of shiny gold duct tape to make it shine!

And there you have it! A perfect Fix-It Felix hammer.

You can click here to see how I made a Fix-It Felix cap for the kiddo's costume and here for a tutorial on the shirt and patch . . . and of course, here for my post on Felix's tool belt, pants, and boots. Thanks for reading!

why do i fix everything i touch?!?

Guess what the big plan is for this year's family Halloween costumes?

The little guy is going as Fix-It Felix. I'm going to let you reach your own conclusions about the costumes the other two of us will be wearing. (Hint: I'm milking this "family costume" thing again, under the assumption the kiddo isn't going to let us do it for too much longer.)

This hat's a pretty easy project to work up with felt and a ball cap, although I had several false starts involving grand delusions of embroidering with the zig-zag function of my sewing machine. Urgh.

The hat was a "misprint" that I picked up -- new with tags -- from Goodwill for $1. I picked out enough of the stitches from the hat's original embroidered pattern that the felt patch would cover what was left. You can see where the lettering used to be, and part of the bulldog's tail.

I used stiffened EcoFelt sheets called Friendly Felt for the patch. You can find it (or something similar) in probably any craft or fabric store; mine came from the aisle of JoAnn Fabrics that houses the other felt craft sheets. I think it cost a buck?

 The yellow piece is 3 inches square with the corners cut off. I cut a blue square a little smaller.

Then I cut out the letters from the navy blue square . . .

. . . and stitched them in place on the sewing machine.

To attach it to the hat, I hand-stitched.

More to come! What have you got going at your house for Halloween this year?

Update: you can check out the shirt and patch + golden hammer + tool belt, pants, and boots tutorials now!

mod sunburst mirror (size large)

Hey everyone! This is my final official entry in this season's So You Think You're Crafty? competition. I'll get a full tutorial up eventually (because this project is not only easily adaptable to a variety of supplies, but is also, dare I say, lovely), but in the meantime, you can read here, in its perfectly formatted entirety, the project I posted there last week. Thank you a million times for your votes and your support, those of you who voted and supported. It was a wild competition!

When I first saw the theme for this week back in December, I knew right away what I wanted to make. Metallic? Check. Shine? Check. Glitter? . . . well, I left out the glitter, but I think I used enough metal to make up for it (and like my husband's always saying about his motorcycle, "It's not glitter; it's metal-flake"). My choice was obvious: A large mid-century modern sunburst mirror.

I lucked out and scored the abandoned, gold-colored aluminum tent poles for $3 at the same rebuilding store (shout out, again, to Bring!) where I found the 75-cent, 4-inch convex mirror and the two light fixture bases ($1 and 50 cents, respectively). It's just that I found them several weeks apart, when I was sure my project was doomed and I wasn't at all sure what I was looking for. Sometimes projects just come together that way.

My project is the result of some amazingly lucky finds (and is nearly two feet across, at its widest point), but this is a pretty versatile project. My tutorial will show you how to make it using dowels, chopsticks, twigs, etc. Everyone can make their own huge mod sunburst mirror! If, like a magpie, you love things shiny, give it a vote!

 

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The CSI Project

all - stars

I found a little pair of Chuck Taylor's at the thrift store which were just the right size, but not the right color. We don't really wear much pink around our house, so I made them into these sweet little day-and-night Chucks for my kiddo as a Christmas present:






These were in practically new condition, as lots of second-hand kids' things are. You can see how the inner soles look pristine.




Even the laces were still pretty new-looking.




Enter Tulip Soft Fabric Paint.


(photo credit)


They come in teensy little one-ounce bottles, which is plenty for little projects like this one, with enough leftover for a bunch more projects. I bought four colors (Yellow, Glacier White, Marine Blue, and Platinum Metallic) for a little over a dollar each; I had the turquoise color left from those baby onesies I painted awhile back. You could also use regular craft acrylic paints; they're colorfast, too, but can be a little stiff. These come out nice and flexible, which is great for stuff kids are going to wear.

First, I painted one shoe solidly Turquoise for the "Day" shoe. I let it dry for about an hour, then added some puffy white clouds with the Glacier White and a tiny little bird with the Marine Blue.




Next, I used the Yellow to turn the "All-Stars" logo into a little sun.




For "Night", I painted the other shoe in Marine Blue, with accents of the Turquoise for depth and the appearance of galaxies.




Using the Glacier White, Yellow, and Platinum paints (alone and in combination) I dotted in stars of varying sizes, and painted in some starbursts, dashed lines (resembling those on a star map), and a little moon near the logo.




My little dude looks pretty darn cute running around in them.







This is a really fun project that can turn out to be pretty time consuming, depending on the complexity of your design. On the other hand, if you were to start with a pair of shoes that was already some shade of blue, it would go faster.

You can also adapt this project for a ton of other designs, as this company does. How well they turn out will totally be dependent on your artistic ability, but a simple Day-and-Night design should be pretty easy to accomplish with decent results.

Total project cost here was under ten bucks, including the sneakers ($4) and paint ($4.50, with lots left over).


(p.s. you can make these photos bigger by clicking on them . . . but you probably knew that!)


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