Dear Sis,

Today William got to wear his bee costume at long last. We’ve had the wings and antenna for over a month, because we found them at Dollar Tree and they were too perfect to pass up! 

The occasion was Barktoberfest at our local library. There was live music, vender tables with treats for the dressed up kiddos and dogs, pizza, and crafts inside the library.

How we made a bee costume

We made the bee body out of yellow and black felt-by-the-yard. The pattern was created by tracing the front neckline and armscye of a tank top onto tissue paper. We made it almost knee length and used a straight edge to make a flared side seam. It looks a lot like a simple dress pattern! We cut two on-the-fold of the yellow felt.

The stripes are two inch strips of black felt, cut long on purpose. We placed the first strip 1/2 inch below the armscye. We measured to make sure we had two inches of yellow showing between each 2 inch black strip. The strips are sewn on 1/4 inch from the top and bottom edges. Then, we trimmed away the excess strip fabric so that the stripes were flush with the sides of the fabric. Lastly, we did 1/2 inch stay-stitching along the neckline and armscye of the front and back panels to keep them from stretching out during dressing and undressing.

Using 5/8 inch seam allowance we secured the shoulder and side seams. For a girl, it might be perfect looking like a little jumper dress. For a boy, we decided to turn the bottom edge under 1 inch for elastic casing so it wouldn’t look too much like a dress! 

This is as close as our bee came to flight:)

Love,

b