I checked out an old Martha Stewart Halloween DVD from the library a
couple weeks ago, and my 2-year-old fell in love with a chicken costume.
But (of course), she wanted to be pink! The original costume had a
shirt sewn to a onesie and then stuffed with cotton to make it extra
fluffy. The poor girl looked a little uncomfortable, and I thought it
would probably suffice to just do feathers and skip the stuffing part
(and would also allow my child to breathe better)! I'm also extra cheap
and didn't want to ruin a shirt. :) I simplified it by just safety
pinning on 2 feather boas to a shirt we had on-hand.
|
Martha Stewart |
The hat was cute, but not really appropriate for our flamingo, and I was
worried my kids would get too hot, and masks aren't allowed at their
school. So, it took some serious brain-storming as to how I was going to
make a face. After browsing around Dollar Tree, I found an ugly parrot
visor head thingie (technical term I'm sure), and knew I could make a
cute flamingo (aka "pink chicken") using the same concept. We also
skipped the somewhat cheesy feet for practical purposes. While they look
cute for a photo shoot, I'm not sure my 2-year-old is agile enough to
walk around with rubber gloves on her feet for hours...
Here are my supplies:
I found everything that I needed at the Dollar Tree. I already had hot
glue, scissors, safety pins, and a long-sleeved shirt on hand.
Shirt
Safety pins
2-3 feather boas (depends on how fluffy you want it and how big your child is)
Googley eyes (I got a variety pack with extra large ones)
Glitter foam paper (they have non-glitter as well, and
that would save $$ if you have more than one child since there are more
than one sheet per color...but mine wanted glitter and pink, so I forked
out the big $$ and bought a pack for each child)
Foam visor (these come in a 3-pack)
Template
Optional:
Fake eyelashes (found in the make-up section...obviously optional but definitely makes her "Glamingo")
Tights (They didn't have pink in the little one's size, so we went ahead with black. My older two girls have pink.)
Skirt (our shirt was extra long for my 2-year-old, so
the tights were enough to do the job, but my older girls will be wearing
tulle skirts with theirs)
Total cost for Glamingo the Flamingo is about $5-8 for one and less (per
costume) for more since you'll only need one pack of googley eyes,
glitter foam paper, etc.
STEP 1: Print your templates and cut them out
STEP 2: Cut out your glitter foam shapes and trim the
visor down. The lines in the "face" piece need to be slit to allow the
beak to be attached.
STEP 3: Fold the black tip of the beak in half and glue
the front edge together. Be sure not to glue all the way around. Leave
the back part open like so:
STEP 4: Fold the pink part of the beak in half just to
get a crease, and then glue across the straight edge and attach to the
black beak tip.
STEP 5: Line up the visor and the face so the centers
are aligned. Then glue each of the tabs to the bottom of the visor (I
found it easier to do the center two first and then the outter two after
those were set).
STEP 6: Stick the three beak tabs into the three slots
on the face, put glue on the tabs, and glue them up (you can see the
underside of my beak is purple in the second pic).
STEP 7: Secure the beak to the visor, so it's not
flopping around. I just added a drop of glue to the end and then another
one on each of the two sides of the beak.
STEP 8: Glamorize! I found it easiest to add the
eyelashes to the eyes before putting the eyes on. That way you can
control which way your eyelashes go. It's harder to get the two sides
(eyelashes) even when they're already on the face.
I didn't snap any pics of pinning the feather boas on. It was pretty
much just trial and error. I wrapped it around like a regular boa and
went from there. Be sure to keep it loose and drapey, so your little one
can pull it on and off their head.
Definitely the cutest, cheapest, easiest costume I've ever made!
As always, I just ask that you share the aloha by becoming a follower if you use one of my PDF's. Mahalo!
Click here for a link to the Google Doc pdf printable.
Aloha,
Charlie