Log #8: Finishing Up

I created a pattern for the tail based upon a pencil skirt that I previously owned, just making it longer. I serged all the inner edges as I went along. Then I sewed on a ruffly top with the leftover tulle that hadn’t been cut into squares. I hand sewed on pearls in sets of 3 or 5 approximately every 3-5 inches, which gathered the tulle into loops on the top of the tail. The effect made it look a little like Ariel’s tail from The Little Mermaid. I painted scales on the tail using a plastic syringe I had. I filled it up with gold craft paint, and used it to squirt on sideways C shapes along the entire skirt. It dried pretty fast and looks pretty cool. Hand sewing on scales or painting with some gradient would have looked more professional, and given a little more depth to the tail, however I only had a few days to finish. I liked the focus to be on the top rather than the tail.

For the base of the tail, I sewed on a section of glittery green fabric that would hide behind the tulle I would add later. This keeps the background of the tulle green rather than transparent where one could see my legs. For the tulle tail pieces I first used some watered down white glue to seal up the edges. The only problem with this is now the tail cannot be washed at all. Using clear nail polish might have worked better, but the white glue allows the tulle to bend and flow better (like an actual tail). I hand sewed on all the squares at alternating heights, then sewed on pearls at the top of each point. Thus, the tail is complete!

Base of tail before adding tulle

Tail with the dark green tulle finished

The top was almost finished,all that was left now was to add the small accents. I embroidered small seashell and wave designs in purple thread on the shiny glitter fabric, just to give the top a little more texture. On the back of the top, to hide the clasp, I glued on more seashells and glass cabochons. I also strung up more pearls (just random sizes), and draped them along the front like the chains.

Adding more pearls

To make the straps look more like seaweed, I hand sewed on small pieces of different colored green ribbon. I also made four strings of seaweed like this and attached them to the end of the crown.

Hair and Makeup:

I did some henna designs on my arms and side. Some designs I based it off of were jellyfish and the common circular water symbol. As far as makeup I tried to keep the color scheme similar to what colors were on the costume. To create scales, I used a piece of netting and brushed on color over top of it. Hair was just curled in ringlets. Mine was luckily just dyed pink on the ends.

Overall, this was a very colorful Halloween costume, and one of my favorites. It was the first Halloween costume where I actually put in a lot of effort, and I'm so happy with the way it turned out.

Mermaid Costume--Log #7

Log #7: 10/20 11 Days

I’ve been working on this costume for a week and I like the progress I’ve been making, but perhaps I should take a day off to catch up on everything else I need to do.

I added glitter to the top today and I love the way it is turning out. I love sparkly things, so I probably just stared at the top for about 5 minutes watching the glitter sparkle. I want to blow all the extra glitter off with the hairdryer right now, but I’m going to wait until after work tomorrow. But I hate waiting for glue to dry! So just to know I did more on the top than just glue glitter on, I added a second loop of chain in the center and glued some glass beads to the back ends of the netting straps.

I added a few u-pins to the end of the crown. It actually stays in my hair now when I move around. I decided I didn’t like the fins on the end so I’ve scratched that idea.

I started work on the tail again. I watched a Martha Stewart craft video where they made their own tail, and it was very inspirational. I think I’m going to do what they did and add scales with gold paint to the tail. It’ll add depth and some shimmer to the otherwise matte tail I have now. Plus, now I’ve learned how people are able to make that fluffy tail base. I cut the green organza I have into four rectangles (they’re very close to squares), pinched them in the middle, and lifted up. It looks great! I feel much more confident about the tail now that I know how I’m doing it. I don’t think I had realized how much I doubted the tail was going to look. I cut the blue tulle into six rectangles, and I’ll place them in between the green ones. The two extra (since there’s six blue and four green) will go in the back to make a small train. Although, would it be a train if it doesn’t touch the ground? Eh, just fluffier in the back, you get the picture. I’m going to have to iron these pieces of tulle and organza, plus add some glue or nail polish to the edges of the organza so it doesn’t fray. I’m definitely going to sew it on rather than hot glue like they did on Martha Stewart. I also plan to look for a few more pieces of tulle or organza around the house and see if I can add those in. It may be too much however with all the color. I’ll see.

Glitterized top!

Freshly cut tulle and organza pieces

Martha Stewart Mermaid Costume

Mermaid Costume--Log #6

Log #6: 10/19 12 Days

Wow the days are really winding down and my schedule is booked solid so I hope I can finish this in time. I sewed on green ribbon to the straps of the top and extended that so it wrapped once around the side band. I then glued the ends down that the sewing machine couldn’t reach and tied and glued all the knots to the threads. I also started working on the crown! I glued on some seashells and pearls. I’m trying to make it look symmetrical. I had to paint the back of the seashells by hand so it doesn’t look terrible from the behind. I’m working on putting together some fins using lace and toothpicks I painted gold. I’m still going to perfect them a little, but I think they’re looking good. They’ll be going on the side of the crown.

Continuing on the top, I’d like to cover the clasp in the back, but I’m not sure how I’m going to do that yet. And I’ve permanently decided to use glitter on the top to fill in all the gaps. Now comes the fun part of using Elmers glue rather than hot glue. Plus I’d like to add some hand stitching to the shimmery material to add some more depth to it.

I haven’t done anything new with the tail. It’s not a part I’m looking forward to, so I’m putting it off.

Sorry if this log was a little all over the place, that’s kind of how I work on projects.

Crown

Top

Fins for crown

Mermaid Costume--Log #5

Log #5: 10/18 13 Days

I completely forgot about the glass pearls! I’ll figure out where to add those later.

I spray painted more seashells because I ran out. Then I hand painted those to fill in any gaps and glued those on. I filled in a bunch of the space with pearls, but there’s still a lot of grey showing. I cut the netting for the top and glued that on. I’ve got another set of straps now! It really helps a lot. I also added a small piece of netting to the bottom edge, and then glued the glass stones and a few pearls onto all the netting.

I remembered a shimmery type of material I got from my aunt a long time ago, and picking out a piece to match the tail, I covered the lacy part of the bra. It looks much better now, but I still think it looks a little tacky. Not sure what to do about that yet.

I also happened to weigh the top, it weighs 0.6 lbs. It doesn’t sound like much but trust me it feels like a lot when I put it on. And it’s not even finished yet!

Mermaid Costume--Log #4

Log #4: 10/17 14 Days

I started gluing seashells onto the bra! It is taking a lot more than I expected, but I just looked at my inspiration picture and I’m adding a lot more than other people. It also used a ton of hot glue, so that also weighs a lot. I glued on large gold mardi gra beads in a sideways S shape around the outside and underside of the bra. I’m going to space the shells out more to make way for more pearls, and i’m going to look at getting some large jewels. I’ve also figured out what piece of netting to use for the straps on the bra. I’m gonna cut the largest piece in half longways and use those pieces. Then I also might sew on the thickest green ribbon onto the straps. It’ll reinforce them and also color the straps. I also plan on filling in the spaces around everything with either glitter or microbeads. I’m just worried it’ll use all my microbeads, which I don’t want. I still need to figure out a way to make the entire top not look slutty.

I started the crown. First I glued on and wrapped the thinnest light green ribbon about an inch up the ends. Then I wrapped another two inches in the dark green, then wrapped the green around the rest of the way longways. I then glued on five gold spikes, evenly spaced. I think I’m going to need to glue on some wire or something to give a base for the seashells to glue onto.

edge of crown

Some seashells glued on!

Mermaid Costume--Log #3

Log #3: 10/16 15 Days

I handpainted all of the seashells to fill in the cracks that the webbing spray couldn’t get into. Turns out the gold paint is shinier than modge podge.

Didn't do much today other than that. More to come tomorrow.

Mermaid Costume--Log #2

Log #2: 10/15 16 days

I made a setup out of foam and skewers to balance the seashells on it while I spray it, so that the paint doesn’t make it stick to the paper. It worked mostly, I’m going to have to hand paint some of the seashells more. But spraying them before and after with modge podge helped the gold webbing to stick better. since I was doing this after dinner, the mosquitos were coming out in full force. I spent the last ten minutes trying to spray everything while fighting them off. I also sprayed the starfish. It’s feeling stronger. I still think it’s pretty fragile.

I washed the stretchy nylon material for the tail. I don’t think it shrunk at all. I folded the material in half so that it stretched left to right, from the folded edge to the two ends basically. Then I placed my pencil skirt on top, and traced around it with chalk, leaving about half an inch seam allowance on all sides. I also extended the skirt about two times the pencil skirt. There will be a lot extra, but that leaves room for messing around with the bottom. Cut it out. Note: MAKE SURE TO PIN IT ON THE SIDES BEFORE PICKING IT UP! I didn’t do this and it was a nightmare to get it lined up again. Sewed up both sides, tried it on, sewed the base a little smaller by about a half inch on both sides. Tried it on again, and it fit perfectly. I wanted it to be a teeny bit looser than I wanted because I will most likely be wearing leggings on Halloween due to the weather. Then I serged both sides and turned it right side out. I then took a piece of the green tulle and cut it so it was about four inches wide by the length of my waist. I folded this piece in half hot dog style. I put on the skirt, right side out, and pinned the green tulle so that the raw edges were up and the folded side down against the skirt. I made a few pleats, two in front, one in the center back, and had the raw sides meet in the center front. I folded these raw corners into a triangle shape and pinned them with the other raw edges along the skirt to make a V shape where my belly button is when the tulle is flipped up (so now it looks like an upside-down V). I sewed this on using the stretch stitch and stretching the fabric as I sewed. The stretch fabric bunched up underneath as I sewed, so I would recommend sewing with the stretch side up, even though it would seem to make more sense to sew with the tulle up since it’s got pleats. If you pin it enough it should be fine. I sewed up some stretch fabric I hadn’t wanted to, so I had to go back and seam rip and sew again. After fixing those, I tried it on one last time to make sure it fit before serging it. I was happy to serge it because tulle frays and I really don’t like working with it once it starts fraying. I might sew down the edge with gold thread, but I’m worried about the stretch of the fabric. Or I could just sew down the edge in parts when I sew on pearls at the top. We’ll see. It’s 10:14pm now I’m going to bed. That’s enough for one night.

Spray Paint setup