Making a Viking costume + a little fuzzy wolf too

I know Halloween's over, but since the weather didn't cooperate much and having all the costumes done was an 11th hour affair, I've only just gotten the last of our photos taken. After all the work this year's costumes took, I definitely wanted a photo record of what the final results were!

Today's costume was one for my teenage son.  This was probably his last year trick or treating so we wanted to make it a good one.  It's also harder to come up with costume ideas that are cool for the bigger kids.  He suggested a Viking, which was fierce and not "babyish", but still fun.

My husband's foam-smithing skills came in handy on this one.  He'd recently finished the horned helmet as a hobby project so we had that ready to go.  It's hard to believe the entire thing is made from sculpted flat foam floor mats, but it is!

He worked with our son to come up with a matching foam shield for it.  I was impressed that my 15yr old cut all the circles (there were 3 layers) using a band saw and then dad did the texturing and painting to give it a faux metal & wood feel:

My main contribution was coming up with a faux fur pelt cape to complete the look.  I didn't have time to get all precise with the pattern so I measured how long it should be from neck to waist and the width to go across his back and around the front and cut a sort of curved trapezoid piece, using a jacket as a rough shape to trace to get the neckline curved right.  I was rushing to get it done so there wasn't even time to take pics in progress.

I used some tan sweatshirt fabric I had in my stash to sew the lining.  I stitched them together right sides facing and the hand stitched the gap for turning it right side out closed. Having the fabric inside made it soft & warm:

I was too busy trying to figure out how to draft up kid #2's Darkwing Duck blazer to sew a vest/shirt/anything else, so my guy & his dad hit the local Goodwill and found this perfect sherpa vest:

My son had the idea for making a sew-on leatherette clasp to keep his cape on (and cover the modern zipper), so he cut it out and I hand-stitched it in place for him using some more handy brass buttons from my grandma's stash.  These had the perfect Viking vibe:

The boots were my husband's idea.  He bought a cheap pair of wellington rubber boots and we cut some fur pieces to cover the foot and calf portions.  They were glued on with a strong rubber cement.  Since we were careful to cut the fur to stay shaggy around the edges, it hid the seams nicely:

And my last costume this year was a cozy wolf for our little lady.  She'd gotten some wolf paw gloves last year and was determined to have a full ensemble for Halloween.  I did a quick job on hers since I had a grey fleece shirt I'd made for her brother's costume last year.

I used a pajama pants pattern to make matching bottoms and whipped up one of my classic fleece wolf hats just for her.  It had been a while since I'd made them - they used to keep me very busy this time of year when I made them for my shop.  Thankfully I just needed to do one this time!

I also made a little plush tail to go on the back of her outfit and the costume was complete.  My perfectionist self normally would've done a full body costume with more details, but with limited time and knowing I already had part of it ready at the get-go, it seemed a waste of time & materials to just start at zero to fulfill my own crafting ego.  

Truthfully speaking, this year's costume-making was more chore than enjoyment since there wasn't much time to work on them beforehand.  Next year the kids will either need to do more of the DIY-ing or pick things that are more basic to make since I'll have a 4th costume to do for our little pumpkin on the way.  Time will be spread even thinner!