R2D2 costume

Tom wanted to be Darth Vader and Anakin this Halloween, so we (I) decided Asher would be R2D2. Asher actually loved the idea, once he understood what I was talking about. We got the Darth Vader costume on sale at TJMaxx, and Tom's Nana provided the Anakin costume (which is actually what inspired Tom to be Anakin ... she'd bought it just as a dress-up thing).

But no way was I going to spend $30 for a toddler R2D2 costume.

First I needed a torso. I used his winter coat to make a sort of tank-top pattern, figuring that it would have to be able to fit over the coat in case we encountered a typical Minnesota Halloween. I made the torso out of white fleece.

The arms were also white fleece. I measured from the top of his shoulder to his wrist for height, then measured around his upper bicep and around his wrist for width. The photo below is sideways -- imagine his shoulder at the right, and his wrist at the left. It needs that funny two-humped curve for the shoulder. I fitted that middle section together and sewed it to create a curve to fit up and around the top of the shoulder.

A Velcro tab held the top of the arm to the torso at the shoulder, and some elastic held the forearm together with a toggle (I could never get Asher to hold still for a fitting, so I really had no idea how much elastic to use). You can see it fairly well below:

The hat was some stretchy silver stuff with a white fleece lining. By the time I got to the head, though, I was all out of wine and it was about midnight. So I just hot-glued on the details.