It's Halloween costume time!
This costume needs just a little bit of explaining. We go to a themed party every year, and this year's theme was Robin Williams. While there's no shortage of costumes to fit such a theme, we were looking for a family friendly option. So we decided to paint Mr. Plum blue! Ok, ok, that wasn't the only reason we picked Aladdin, but it was definitely a bonus! Mr. Plum was obviously the Genie to include Robin Williams' roll in the film, I went as Jasmine, and Little Plum was the magic carpet. I'll give you the break down on the adult costumes in this post. The fabulous toddler magic carpet costume deserves a post all it's own!
The basics of our adult costumes were dance costumes (our harem pants and my top). We purchased ours from Amazon, but you can find them much cheaper on eBay if you order well in advance to account for international shipping. A note about sizing - Mr. Plum and I are both wearing extra larges! The sizes are Asian and teeny tiny! I had to completely remove the elastic from the waistband of my pants to make them lay right. The fabric is stretchy enough that I didn't replace the elastic with anything, I just left it out all together.
My costume was simple enough to finish off with some gold jewelry and gold ballet flats. My headband and it's embellishment are from Joann's.
My ponytail holders were covered with strips of blue fabric secured with Velcro dots. And that's it! Easy peasy.
Mr. Plum's costume had a few more DIY details to really make it true to the movie. His top is a light blue athletic compression top (also purchased from Amazon) so that we didn't have to paint his entire body!
We finished off the costume with a simple red sash sewn from red stretchy velour fabric and gold wrist cuffs sewn from a similar fabric. Both secured with Velcro dots.
The genie shoes were a bit of a last minute complication. We set out to buy some jester shoes the day of the party, but it turns out those aren't exactly a hot costume item this year and nowhere carried them. Rather than break character, Mr. Plum promptly took me to the fabric store and
Start by tracing the sole of a low profile shoe (I used Mr. Plum's running shoes) and add a point off the toe approximately the length of the curl you'd like on the shoe.
Next trace the side of the shoe, adding the curled toe using the length of the sole pattern as a guide for the length of the curl.
Cut two soles and four sides from stretchy fabric. I used the same gold velour used for the genie wrist cuffs. I added approximately 1/4 inch seam allowance to the side pieces. I didn't add any seam allowance to the sole pieces (the thickness of tracing around the tennis shoe made up for it).
Begin assembly by sewing the two side pieces together at the heels and along the curved top, right sides together.
Now that you have the two sides attached, sew the sole onto the sides with right sides together. You may have to fudge a bit with this step (especially if you made your pattern in, say, the last 15 minutes before you needed to leave the house!). I made sure to line up the toe seams and left any fudging to be done on the heels since that wouldn't be seen as much. Also be prepared to use about a thousand straight pins to hold all those curves together. Once the sole is sewn on, turn everything right side out and you should have a shoe.
I added a little stuffing to help the toes keep their shape. If I'd had more time I might have finished the ankle opening, but since this was eleventh-hour-speed-sewing I just left that portion unfinished.
That's it for our Jasmine and Genie costumes. In the end our DIY versions weren't much cheaper than pre-made costumes, but the pieces are much more versatile and I know we will use them again (harem pants are comfy, yo!). I'll share all the details of Little Plum's magic carpet costume in my next post.
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