With a busy morning of getting everyone in their costumes, we just had time to snap a quick shot of my son in his Quidditch uniform before running to catch the school bus.

I am happy to say I finished his costume without staying up til 2:00 am.  Sewing the costume jersey was actually was very easy, despite the fact that I made the pattern up in my head.  I only used my seam ripper twice.  Once because I thought I had made a mistake, and the other because I realized I had done it right the first time.  The fabric was called Ponte, and I was able to by it at 50% off bringing my total in fabric to only $6.  It looked athletic fabricish and all in all was the perfect fabric for the project.

For this costume, the devil was in the details.  Most of the time was spent sewing the ribbon trim.  For the trim I used the wrong side of a  3/8″ satin gold ribbon.  The ribbon however didn’t have the ability to curve the way it should, and if I were to do it again, I would have invested in a  1/4″ Bias Tape Maker.  I could have used gold cotton fabric to make the bias tape (my Mom’s suggestion all along) and it would have made the curves nicely without buckling like the ribbon did.  But you know what they say about costumes?  If you can’t see it from a galloping horse, the mistake really doesn’t matter.  (At least that’s what I tell myself.)  The other thing they say is “Always listen to your mother.”

The best part was using Transfer Magic- Transfer to Dark to make the numbers and crest for the costume.  It worked like a charm.  I made the numbers in Word using Arial Bold sized to 650 percent and colored gold.  Then I printed them from a inkjet printer.  Again, since it isn’t recommended to use the Transfer Magic on synthetic fabrics, I kept the iron moving slightly to keep it from leaving an iron mark.  I also put grommets and lacing down the sides of the costume.

Ben wore his gray athletic pants and a gray long sleeve waffle t-shirt under the jersey. We did buy in a Quidditch accessories kit and broom from the costume shop.  They were made in Taiwan, and guess what?  They are utter garbage.   I wish I would have used my ingenuity and made something out of faux leather.  I could have made the goggles using a tutoral from dadcando.com (Have I mentioned how much I dig this site.)  I think I want to try and make the snitch they have on Dadcando as well.

They’re off to our little yellow school bus…  which they are imagining is the H0gwart’s Express.

13 Responses to “Just in Time- Harry Potter Quidditch Costume”