Rabbit Report #17

More Rabbit Headpiece Refinements

After seeing the children perform in the rabbit headpieces on Tuesday, I knew that the headpieces needed some retro-fitting. I knew that there probably would be, I wasn't kidding myself about that. I set aside a day this week to work on them so they could be returned to the school for the next rehearsal.

I knew this because these headpieces seemed big when I was making them and trying them on my son. Both the paws and the headpieces seem big for the pattern I'm using. Do recall that I took 2" off the length of ears for the larger sizes. I bought the pattern in a smaller size (2-3-4-5) for the smaller rabbits, expecting some of the pieces, the ears especially to be scaled down in size for the smaller costumes. Check out the ear pieces below, do think that was true?

I didn't think so. As I was cutting the pieces out of the tissue, something about the size of that ear struck me so I got the larger sized one (6-7-8) to compare. They're the same size whether you're making the costume in a size 2 or a size 8! Right. I cut shorter and narrower ears for the smaller rabbits.

I got some headpiece advice via a comment from Kathleen C., which was much appreciated and excellent. She is a professional costumer, so she knows what she is talking about! One of her suggestions was to make the base of the ear into a circle, wire that and then hand stitch the ear to the head, giving it a better support base. I did a modified version of that to help with ear stability as they were a bit too floppy in rehearsal.

Another thing I did was to put a dart right at the corner of the face to tighten up the headpiece around the face, and prepare it for the next little modification.

The next modification is the bane of all children's hats and headpieces, and I know the rabbits probably won't like it: the elastic chin strap! This is one way of keeping the headpiece in place, because these rabbits hop. Those rabbits hop a lot, too!

I had my son hop around the house a bit with a retro-fitted hood and his stayed nicely in place. We'll see at the next rehearsal! I will get rabbit photo posted when I can get the costumes back for a short bit, just to get the children dressed in them. That might be next week, but definitely would be the week after, as the play is in two weeks.

Parting Shot: Butterick 2407, c. 1962. This is the last pattern that my daughter chose. She chose this one not for this summer, but for school next fall. She liked the dress and the jumper, soI suppose I'll have to pull this one out in the fall.