Disney Princess Goes Princess Peach - Simplicity 2813

Generally speaking, my family and I attend Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party at the Magic Kingdom in Orlando every year. 

Our first MNSSHP. Obviously I'm no stranger to Princess costumes.

This year my mom and my sister are dressing up as Mario & Luigi, so naturally being the princess of the family they voted me to be Princess Peach. I knew I wanted to sew myself the costume, and a quick google search lead me to Simplicity 2813.



 

Meant of course to be used for Disney Princesses Snow White or Cinderella, but it just so happens that Princess Peach's dress is incredibly similar in style to Cinderella's. Just a switch up of the colorway and you've got yourself a Nintendo Princess.

Instantly I began plotting my dress and became ridiculously excited about sewing myself a Princess dress. Well, duh. I thought I would use glitter organza for the contrast pieces, but instead I used a shimmery organza since I couldn't find the glitter version. I also picked up some uber cheap pale pink costume satin for the main dress, fully anticipating it to be a nightmare to sew.

 

The pattern instructions either assume you just know to do certain steps, or my skillz have gotten so damn good that I've just set a higher standard for myself. The pattern barely tells you to press anything, much less to finish any seams. It's entirely possible that they don't tell you to because 1) you are likely going to wear this outfit once or twice, and don't need it to hold up well, or 2) because the bodice is lined they figure you don't need to finish your seams. For this reason I wasn't going to line it, but then I thought cotton would feel much better against my skin than cheap polyester. So things I did to bump up the quality were to press my seams open, press my darts toward the sides, and pink all my raw edges. Pretty standard things that weren't included in the pattern instructions. If I really wanted to be awesome, I could have understitched the lining too but the muslin I used to line the bodice took a pressing pretty well. I don't think I'll have any peekaboo lining issues.

I shortened the skirt by 16" to bring it up to tea length. I plan on wearing a petticoat with the outfit to boost the Princess factor. Plus, petticoats are just plain awesome. I shortened the bodice by 1/2" and used the smallest size for the neckline dip and strap widths, just because I tend to be small in the shoulders and I find patterns often make necklines too conservative for my taste. The costume satin surprisingly was not a nightmare to sew, though it does fray like the dickens. It also makes an awful sound while being sewn, like my needle is perforating the fabric. Which, it probably is. We'll see how the dress wears. I have the Halloween party as well as a Halloween ... party ... like a real one. Florida will likely be hot and schewtty, so the costume will probably go through a gentle washing between them.  Luckily I've got a wonderful bottle of Soak handy for things like this.

Dad came too.

In the end this costume turned out pretty sweet, albeit REALLY BIG.  I didn't want to redo the entire bodice, so I had Hubs pinch in the excess from the back zip.  I ended up taking out 4+ inches from the back, grading to zero at the waist.  If I had taken it in at the waist I really would have needed to redo some things since the overskirt puffs were already nicely sewn in.  It fit okay at the waist anyway.  The bodice front still gapes, a lot.  I'm only going to wear this costume this year so I'm just going to leave it as is.

One thing I am happy about is this was my first lapped zipper.  I've read tutorials but they still seemed confusing.  Funny that I should learn something like how to do a lapped zipper from a Big 4 pattern.

So. Much. Fun!