Snowflake Outfit: Accessories

  This is the final post of the snowflake outfit... all the pieces I didn't include in another post! ;-)

  First, the hat. This was super-simple... just two felt circles with a hole cut from one, and some glitter waistband elastic. Oh, and a tulle pom-pom. =) The hole is very slightly larger than the circumference of Booper's head, and the whole circle has a radius 2 inches larger than that, plus seam allowances.

  I sewed the circle and 'doughnut' together along the outer edge, and turned them right side out. I sewed the elastic, which I cut to fit around Booper's head, into a loop and top-stitched the seam allowance down on both sides, then zig-zagged it on, one edge of it overlapping the right side of the hole's edge. The pom-pom was made using an approximately 2" by width of fabric strip of tulle and a pom-pom maker (which, though completely unnecessary, makes the process much faster).

  Next,the muff! Also super-simple... this is a rectangle, sewn the same way as an infinity scarf would be, but with different proportions. I don't know the measurements because I didn't measure... I just used my hands to guess at the size.

  I used a curly faux-fur from Hobby Lobby... I tried to cut it properly, just through the backing, not cutting any of the fur, but this particularly fur is pretty stretchy and a little bit slippery, so I ended up using a rotary cutter in order to get a straight edge. The curliness hides the cut portions pretty well, but it did leave shiny, soft, strands everywhere!

  The boots were a gift from my husband's grandma.

  I painted the backdrop... I looked at a bunch of snowy photos first to get an idea of what I wanted to do then started adding a lot of white paint to my grey backdrop paper. The paper isn't really ideal for this... it wrinkles easily and is extremely absorbent. It was kind of like trying to paint on a wad of paper towels.

  Then I added rough trees, and was trying to paint the snow on them and it was looking pretty awful when my husband came home. He watched for a few minutes and then showed me a way to paint it that worked much better! I added pale blue for the shadows in the snow, and a slightly greyed version of the same blue for darker shadows, and dry-brushed white across the 'sky' for a blustery look. It's not a very realistic painting, and you'd probably never guess that I spent hours on it (it's just so big and the brushes I have are not!) but it was pretty close to what I wanted for these photos!

  I put cushions in a few spots on the floor, covered with white fabric and a layer of batting, for snowdrifts:

  Then I strung white pom-poms and a few small paper snowflakes from invisible thread, which I taped to a piece of white foam-core board. Then the hardest part of all, trying to hang that contraption from the ceiling! I was standing on a tippy rolling chair, trying desperately to push a thumbtack into the ceiling while holding up two separate loops of string to keep the board balanced and utterly failing. The thumbtacks just would NOT go in! I even tried hammering them, but they only bent, and I finally flopped down on the ground and declared, 'I give up!' But I'm annoyingly stubborn and no matter how many times I say I'm going to quit I usually just can't. So I brought out the finish nails, and pounded some into the ceiling, and bent them to make hooks. Then I tied on the strings, added the empty board, and taped all of the invisible thread pieces back on (after spending quite some time untangling them). It would have been much easier to just tape the strings of pom-poms to the ceiling. And they aren't even noticeable in the photos! But at least they gave Booper something to play with!

  So there you have it, the most detailed outfit I've ever made. =)

  I'll be back in the (hopefully) near future with an outfit I made for Foof. =)

Thanks for stopping by,