Do your kids LOVE Despicable Me? Zach & Lily are obsessed!
For Halloween Zach asked to be Gru from Despicable Me, which I thought was uber adorable, especially when I had the 'evil genius idea' to create a Lucy Wilde costume for Lovely Lily!
After I had a plan in place, as any normal warm blooded 4 year old would do, Zach changed his mind. Now he was bound and determined to be a Minion for Halloween...
After a quick re-planning of my initial plan; I re-assigned characters to the kids, incorporated Andy as Gru, the former villain turned good guy and myself as Lucy Wilde, the Anti Villain League Agent and Gru's Love Interest. I placed a call to a Dear Crafty Friend for a few D.I.Y Minion costumes, started sewing up a storm and supply shopping for a husband-size Gru! As a Side Note: Many, Many of the costumes we have created are also available in a DIY Kit in our online shop at www.lilyandfrog.com. Happy Halloween Shopping!
DIY Instructions for a Lucy Wilde Costume...
Lily & Frog Materials:
- Long Coat: Pattern 1540 Misses’ & Miss Petite Jackets from Simplicity
- Turquoise fleece (Yardage based on pattern size)
- Old Sunglasses
- Blue & white acrylic paint
- White and orange/red polka dot scarf
- Simple dress – I wore jeans under instead of Lucy’s Dress, too much sewing
- Images to create Lucy’s badge
- 4x6 stock paper
- cardboard
Lily & Frog Instructions:
1. Jacket: Starting with pattern packet 1540 Misses’ & Miss Petite from Simplicity; this pattern packet appeared to be the most straight forward and simplistic. There are 4 coat options available in this packet, chose pattern A for this costume. Purchase the correct length of fabric, based on the chart on the size chart. If you have questions someone in the store will be able to help you. In my case, I purchased turquoise fleece for my design: keeping me warm on a chilly Fall New England night AND fleece will not fray as your sewing with it - DOUBLE WIN! Follow all instructions to create your jacket choice. For this costume, I altered the pattern slightly:
- No Buttons at the shoulder blades
- No Extra Stitching on the sleeves by the wrists
- No Pockets
- No Buttons, replaced with snaps
Also, I probably skipped a few steps without knowing it... After about the 3rd night of sewing, reading a new language, cutting and pinning I was going a little bonkers
2. Sunglasses: Snag a pair of old sunglasses, and blue and white acrylic paint. Mix the blue and white acrylic paint to get the correct turquoise color in the jacket. Paint the sunglasses one layer at a time; allow each layer to dry completely before beginning the next layer. If the previous layer to tacky, the paint to peel off because the sunglass surface is slick… I’m assuming if you run sandpaper over the painting area, creating a rough surface will prevent the paint from peeling. This took about 4 coats of paint.
3. Scarf: Purchase your white polka dot scarf. You can probably find the same color fabric in the fabric store while your buying turquoise fleece, but I didn't think of it, oh well. This link was here in only a few days from amazon!
4. Lucy’s AVL I.D. Badge & Wallet:
- Search online for an image of Lucy and her I.D. Badge, this is the image I worked off:
- Crop Lucy’s face from the image and design your I.D. Badge. F.Y.I. I'm not a Digital Design Savvy kinda gal, using MS-Word I created the layout for the I.D. Badge, printing it on 4x6 stock paper. I also designed my own AVL image from the original.
- To create the wallet cut a 9x13 rectangle (big enough to glue both the I.D. Badge and AVL image), painting all sides and edges with leftover paint from the sunglasses. Fold it in half, gluing the I.D. Badge and AVL image on opposite interior sides... Lucy's I.D. Badge faces the crease and AVL faces the outside.
5. Dress: Honestly… I didn’t want to keep sewing, there was no CHEAP dresses online (which I could find). Plus, when I think of Lucy Wilde, I remember her long turquoise jacket, red hair, and turquoise sunglasses. I'm OK with passing on this part… But if you designed one of your own Lucy Wilde Costumes, let me know, I’ll link to it and share!
6. Hair: I already have red hair! Not as red as her hair, but I’ll take what I can get because I'm not about to color my hair or wear a wig (too much work for this busy Mama). Create a high pony tail, teasing up the back to get a little extra height and fluff.
I L-O-V-E this costume… It is one of my more timely costumes to create because of sewing the jacket, but in the end it came out adorable with our Gru Family!