Spooky shirt

It's Hallowe'en soon, and the onslaught of compulsory dressing-up parties for toddlers.  It seems like in the US, any costume goes, however in old blighty we stick to the traditional witches, pumpkins, skeletons and perhaps a zombie or vampire or two.  Sadly it's much cheaper to buy a shiny scratchy polyester outfit from the supermarket than it is to buy the fabric and make your own wonky creation.  That makes me a bit sad, mostly because I can't justify 1m of orange cotton on economy grounds.

Note the sticker from a pumpkin he has applied to his tummy.  Also, this is his "smile" face (eyes are shut).

Nevertheless, Toddler Button gets his own special shirt for the occasion, because it turns out you can just about squeeze my age 2-3 shirt pattern from a piece of 75cm wide 1m cotton for £2.20 off ebay (free postage!).  Here, squeeze means really squeeze: I had to piece the under-collar from two scraps of fabric to make this baby work.

I thought spools of black and white thread never ran out in this house, but it turns out they do run out if you don't keep buying them.  Boo hoo.  Therefore, because I was light on time and thread, we have minimal top-stitching and some of the buttonholes might be stitched with grey/brown thread on the reverse.  Also I was short of one orange button, so we have a different button friend lurking on the collar stand.

The bits all over my floor are pegs.  Thanks, toddler.

I'm sorry that my child is not going as a "thing", but he will look cool (I hope) with his spiders and trick-or-treating skeletons.  I wanted to get shiny sliver and black spiderweb fabric, but it's probably as well it was twice the price because it would have been a bit Liberace.

Model wears his new shirt over a long-sleeve t-shirt.  Did you really think I'd have enough fabric for long sleeves?!  He's also pretty pleased about the buttons, because he can now say "Orange!".

Next year, maybe I should make him this outfit?!  Ha ha!