When a costume needs mending, the last thing on my mind is taking photos of my work. I want to fix what needs fixed as quickly and as neatly as possible, so stopping to take photos hardly ever occurs to me. I just get too absorbed in my work. I like the work I do, so I just want to keep working!
Here are a few of my recent sewing projects. I hope you will bear with the lack of progress photos.
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Mary Poppins Halloween Costume
Disney’s 1964 film Mary Poppins is a favorite of mine, and I’ve been thinking about the dress Julie Andrews wore during the “Jolly Holiday” scene since I was five years old. For Halloween in 2025, my partner and I dressed up as Bert and Mary, fulfilling my childhood dream!
With limited resources and time, I knew I was never going to be able to completely recreate such a beautiful ensemble by costume designer Tony Walton. My goal was to be as faithful to the colors, textures, and silhouette as I could within my tight budget and time frame.
I started by visiting thrift stores. I found a dress similar to the image below, and used it as the base of my costume.
I seam-ripped the lace to remove it from the bodice. I originally intended to remove the bodice completely and only use the skirt, but that would have been unnecessarily time-consuming for this project.
Next, I cut the hemline down to tea-length. The poly chiffon was slippery, and I do not have a rolled hem foot, but I did have quite a bit of spare lace trim. I opted to finish the hems of both the lining and the outer chiffon layer with the trim.
To help create volume and shape, I added a petticoat I had laying around (as seen in my ren faire outfit), as well as a red skirt I made from a thrifted red dress (also trimmed with lace, for consistency). The real dress includes layers of red in the skirt that really pop when Mary Poppins dances, and it’s one of my favorite details. I hand sewed bows of red ribbon to the outer layer, and the skirt was completed.
I purchased this shirt from an online thrift store. No shirt was exactly what I was looking for, but I chose this one as it was sheer, and had a collar I liked. I hand sewed red ribbon to the cuffs and the collar.
To create the ruffles on the front of the bodice, I used the leftover skirt fabric. I sewed two long silo-shaped pieces together (with the lace trim in-between), and turned them inside out. From there, I gathered the fabric at the center to create ruching, and sewed one more layer of lace ribbon on top.
The blouse appeared white in the listing online, but in reality was an off-white, meaning it didn’t quite match the skirt. Truthfully, this drove me nuts, but you have to know when to move on!
With a corset (purchased online) and a parasol (borrowed from a friend), the look was completed!
Most of my partner’s outfit was purchased online, but I did thrift the pants and shoes for him, and I sewed him a pocket square made from leftover skirt fabric and the last of the lace trim. Additionally, I hot-glued cardboard to his hat to give it some structure, as it was originally rather sad and floppy.
I had about 15 hours to complete this project, including the time spent gathering materials. I am proud of what I accomplished in that amount of time. The most wonderful part was how much fun I had doing it! My partner and I ended up winning best couple’s costume at the Halloween party we attended, too!
Plushies
For Christmas in 2025, I made plushies for many of my loved ones. Here are my favorites!
For my mother, I decided to sew a plush version of our dog, Sparky, who passed away in 2024.
I used thrifted fabric and a free pattern online (which I adjusted to better suit Sparky’s proportions) to create this plushie. His facial features were hand-embroidered.
One of my brother’s favorite video games is Luigi’s Mansion for the Nintendo GameCube. I decided to sew a plushie of the main antagonist, King Boo.
I once again used thrifted fabric, as well as felt for the crown, eyes, and tongue.
For my partner, I made a plushie of The Knight, the player character from one of his favorite video games, Team Cherry’s Hollow Knight.
I used a pattern I made from scratch for this project. This was the first plushie I made, and I didn’t have access to a sewing machine at the time, so I hand-stitched the whole thing together using primarily slip/ladder stitches, with whip stitches to secure the eyes.
All of my plushies were stuffed using leftover scrap fabric. Reduce, reuse, recycle!
Tote Bag
For my birthday in 2026, my partner’s mother gave me a few yards of fabrics from Japan. To thank her for the gift, I used one of the fabrics to make her a tote bag.
The straps are reinforced, the inside is lined, and the two sides are sewn together with French seams, all in the hopes that this bag will be durable enough to survive years of use.
I didn’t use a pattern for this project, I just measured and hoped for the best. I think it turned out pretty well!
