Ha Ha said the Clown!

I've been busy putting this clown outfit together...Now three days later I have emerged from totally trashing the dinning room. I didn't clean up after my last project and there was fabric, scraps, and thread everywhere. Not to count all the pins embedded in my carpet, lucky I have a big magnet on the fridge!

I wasn't sure how I was going to make a clown costume, until I spotted this wonderful tutorial on sewing a clown costume over at sew mama sew. The style and design looked very simple and quick to sew. I envisaged that 'this will not take me very long'.

Well it took me a lot longer than I thought because I took a liking to putting circles on the clown pants. I had to sew them on using the blanket stitch setting on my Bernina Activa 220. It took me quite a  while to do that...

My exciting moment though was finding these four large red buttons in my button jar. They were perfect for the straps but very tricky to sew on as they have such small shanks.

The sewing pattern I used was Simplicity 2037 (size S) for the clown pants. I just cut the pyjama pants legs much shorter. For the bands, straps, and bow tie I drafted a pattern. The attached straps cross over at the back of the clown pants and are sewn onto the back band. Buttons are then sewn on top of the straps and this  helps hold them in place too.

For the bow tie I cut an oblong 16"x6" and a smaller oblong I think it was 5"x 3" out of the red satin.  But measurements don't really matter for the bow tie. You can make it as large as you like or as small as you like. To attach the bow tie I hand sewed onto a red satin band which is then fastened with Velcro at the back.

Working it all out....but I forgot
to sew the striped pockets into the
side seams. I changed the tie to
a bow tie too!

Tracing out the circles and
cutting to size using fabric
fro my stash

Ready to press the iron-on stiffening
onto the circles

Placing the circles where I
want them

Red satin leg bands sewn on. I used
iron-on stiffening in all bands. As the
white fabric I used is fairly stiff it
helped to keep the box shape of the
pants

I top-stitched the pants in yellow
thread...

This is a bit of a squeeze perhaps I
should have used the Juki...

Sewing the heart onto the T-shirt

I knew these old buttons would
come in handy one day...

Making a bow tie out of
red satin

All finished there is boning in
the red waist band