The Little Mermaids (DIY Halloween Costumes)

 Cuteness overload. Seriously. We've got not one, but two little mermaids here. I can't even stand it. This costume wasn't too difficult to make. The fabric was bought from Joanns (using coupons, YEAH for coupons). The yarn was on hand (notice the two shades of red). The onesie was sort of a splurge (hard to find specific colors sometimes), but I only spent $25 per costume and they're way

 super cute!!!!

MATERIALS for 2 costumes sized at 12 months:
1 yard mermaid fabric
2 yards tulle
1/3 yard stretch fabric
1/2" elastic for waist measurement
thread
Onesie (I found the nude color on Amazon)

ONE: Get measurements...I took chest, waist, waist-to-knee, and knee to foot
TWO: Cut a two inch wide band for waist and cut it about two inches bigger than actual waist measurement.
Cut skirt piece 1 1/2" longer than waist-to-knee measurement and about 1 1/2 times bigger than waist measurement.
Cut chest piece 7" by two inches longer than chest measurement
Cut five to seven pieces of tulle, length by the width of the tulle. The amount of tulle you have will depend on how long you cut it. I cut five that were the knee to foot measurement and then a couple of pieces that were about 3 inches longer.

THREE: Gather skirt piece to fit waist band, then attach skirt to waist piece

 

FOUR: Gather bottom of skirt....don't gather as much as waistband...but enough so that it looks poofy (is that a word?)

FIVE: Gather tulle a couple of pieces at a time. I actually gathered it by hand. I used big stitches and it worked better for me to do it that way.

SIX: Attach tulle to bottom of skirt.

Gathered bottom, with gathered tulle attached

SEVEN: Fold top piece of mermaid costume in half with wrong sides togehter and attach to tail piece

EIGHT: With matching thread gather about an inch on the center front of the top. This will help make it look more like Ariel's sea shells

NINE: Sew up the back seam of sea shell piece  leaving about four inches from the top. Stitch the rest of the top seams down so the edges are not raw.

TEN: Sew a hook-an-eye to the top.

ELEVEN: Using matching thread, and using very small stitches, hand sew the mermaid costume to onesie. I simply sewed very small stitches around the top of the purple and then ran a few stitches down the center back.

*****Make sure your onesie is plenty big on baby, otherwise you will struggle to get costume on and off.

TWELVE: Make yarn wigs and have a photo shoot! 

YARN WIG TUTORIAL 

She's trying to swim away!

I had to throw some props in there