Handmade Monster Costume: refashion from an old jacket or shirt

This Monster Costume was a really easy refashion of an old fleece jacket I found at the cabin.  With added detail from pieces of orange fleece and white felt, it really came together!

When my son wanted to be a monster for Halloween, I thought about making it for him, but looked around because I wanted to make sure he had a great costume and I didn't want it to look like a sad, homemade attempt by Mom.

As I was cleaning out the old clothes at the cabin, I realized I could make a much better monster costume than any I was seeing online.  When I found this old fleece, I got right to work.

The first thing I did was cut off the arms of the jacket.  I placed a pin at his shoulder while he wearing the jacket.  I then held the end of the sleeve to his wrist and placed a pin at the shoulder again.

I matched the two pins together to form the new sleeve and trimmed it down.

I had the jacket inside out and kept the sleeve the way it was so I could insert it into the arm hole and sew the right sides together.

To create the legs, I just eyballed the middle (it's pretty big, so I wasn't worried about it being perfect) and sewed a line up my estimated middle to the point I pinned at his crotch while he was wearing the jacket.  I then sewed on either side of that line and cut along the line to form two legs.

The Monster Costume needed a hood for the monster head and this jacket didn't have a hood, so I created one out of the top part of one of the sleeves.

I decided to use the seam of the shoulder to create the hood and, since all monsters need some spikes, I sewed the end with three triangles instead of straight across.

I then ripped open the seam of the sleeve and sewed that edge to the inside of the collar.

The shoulder seam made the perfect edge and, by placing the hood inside the collar, it gave it a great finished look.  Check out those spikes - so cute!

I found some orange fleece and began cutting two large pieces for horns on the hood, six medium pieces for toenails, and six smaller pieces for fingernails.

I cut them all on a folded edge, and you'll see why in a minute.

I opened the pieces and sewed down the middle once they were in place.  Then I folded up the sides and sewed all the way around the edge.  This made it easier to place the horns/claws where I wanted them and gave them some stability once they were sewed together.

Once the horns were done, I cute some teeth out of white felt and pinned them under the hood.

When the teeth were sewed on, I used some extra felt for the back of the googly monster eye.

I glued the eye to the felt, but the little guy pulled it off in about two seconds, so some extra strong double stick tape worked the best.

Here's my Little Monster!

I think he likes it and it will be a great warm costume for a Minnesota Halloween!

This thing looks so warm and comfy he may just want to wear it all the time!

Trick or Treat!