“Home Couture” DIY Spiderweb Witch Halloween Costume

I’m not a big fan of the most Halloween costumes sold at the stores for the tweens and teens. Most of them are inappropriate, and every single dress is too short or suggestive. My daughter is 11 years old, and she has a very classy style, but since everyone else is dressing up in these short skirts (and what I would call more like “sexy witches” style than anything else), she also drew a picture of her own Halloween costume design that included short skirt and even high heels.

Since we couldn’t find anything in the stores that would be fun, fashionable and appropriate for our tween, I was set to design a “home couture” Halloween costume for my daughter that incorporated the witch and spiderweb designs from her drawings.

SUPPLIES:
Hanes Youth ComfortBlend EcoSmart® Crewneck Sweatshirt in Black
($7.99)
Freaky Fabric for decorating
Acrylic jewels
Elmer’s All Purpose Glue
Decorative plastic bat
Decorative plastic spiders (100 in a bag)
2 Felt Table Runners from Target
Velcro
additional items to make the outfit:
black leggings
, witch broom & witch headband/hat (hers are from Target)
boots (she is wearing UMI boots in the pictures)
I also want to spray paint the broom black before Halloween but we didn’t get to do it yet..

SPIDERWEB SKIRT FROM TABLE RUNNERS
1. Measure your little witches waist to make the skirt in the right size. We made ours for 28″ waist. You will need to make three cuts in each of the two table table runners as pictured below. We made each cut about 4 1/2″ wide on the top and 9″ deep.
How to calculate the correct size: (Table runner size – 1/2 waist – 2)/3 if you are using two table runners.
Basically you will need to minus how many inches the waist is from the table runner width plus add a few inches for sewing and you will be able to get the correct size for the skirt.

2. Sew all of the cuts together and the two table runners together from the back side. Leave the other end open.
3. Sew the velcro on the other end of the skirt. Ideally buy black velcro, but I used white one and just sewed a black packing for it from an old black t-shirt.
4. Finish the skirt by gluing plastic spiders and acrylic jewels on it.

SPIDERWEB TOP FROM HANES SWEATSHIRT
Buy the Hanes Youth ComfortBlend EcoSmart® Crewneck Sweatshirt

1. Wash & dry the freaky spiderweb fabric if you bought it from home decorating section. It will probably rip more and be even more authentic looking after that and it will be safer to wear without all the chemicals in it.
2. Ask your trick-or-treater to “wear” the freaky spiderweb fabric as a “poncho” length wise, in way that her will come through of one of the wholes in it and the long ends of the fabric cover her arms. Cut the hole larger if needed for her head and form sleeves from the ends of the fabric. Attached the “sleeves” with a few pins and remove the “poncho” before sewing the sleeves with a sewing machine. Make sure that the sleeves are wide enough so the sweater will fit under it. It’s OK if they are too wide.
3. Ask your model to wear the Hanes sweatshirt and then the spiderweb poncho (that looks more like a bolero now) on the top of it and start gluing the web into the shirt. Remember to use fabric or all purpose glue that will dry clear. I used a lot of glue because after washing the web it was pretty much falling apart. Let dry at least for two hours before adding additional decorations.
4. After the glue in the web has entirely dried add the plastic bat on the shoulder with by sewing it it (I also used glue to attach it well), and glue spiders and acrylic jewelry on the top as wished.

The best about this DIY Halloween witch costume is that it is truly unique, and while I wouldn’t call it haute couture, it truly is home couture and custom made for Isabella. We had a lot of fun creating it together, and the end result combines the trendy look kids like but it still covers up and is appropriate for a child. I think you could create a costume for an adult using the same idea, and next I am trying to find a felt table runner with snowflakes to try to use this idea for a snow princess costume for my other daughter.

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