Elsa dress, glitter spray, fast pleat, and a pattern trick

So this year my girls want to be Anna and Elsa for Halloween.  My oldest saw a pattern at the store asked for it and I thought it would be easier then making it up, but I found lots of things I didn't like about it. I decided that I wasn't going to use the pattern for the Anna dress and make some changes to the Elsa dress.

So first thing I don't like about this pattern is the large difference between sizes, I normally don't use patterns for kid clothing so this might be normal...

Also a great trick for cutting out patterns is to lay the patterns on the back of a chair to keep little hands and paws away from the pattern.

On to the the dress, it was pointed out to me that Elsa's cap does NOT come around to the front. So for my observant child I  made a few changes.

So I laid out the pattern over the fabric with the straight edge parallel to the fold.

I cut a curve along the bottom to add to the flowyness of the cape.

Then because I wanted it to be fuller I did a fast pleat. I pinned down the corner far enough away to leave room for a hem. Keeping the fabric layered.

Take both layers of fabric and fold them under in approximately even sections. 

Pin down.

Keep going until you get close to the arm hole, then cut out cape.  Now cut about half way down along the fold to allow access to the zipper.

Then unfold and refold  pleats so they both face out

 and sew down to keep in place.

Add narrow hem to outside of cape and in the middle. 

Next I added some of this spray glitter to make it shimmer and shine. You want to do this outside it goes everywhere. Also it will cause fabric to stick to what ever it is on or itself.

This was how I sprayed it.

And my little helper kept the fabric from sticking to itself and helped it dry faster. 

I sprayed it at different distances, it got some splatters and clumps on it but it added to the snow covered look I was going for.

Finished flowing the pattern and ....

Front

Back

One last note I added a "snowflake" stitch to the sleeves and collar. Not sure exactly what it is called but it is the one that looks like ****It really added to the dress and my little one loves that her dress is covered in snowflakes.