I am a child of DIY. Part of the reason I am a STEMie is because I am not my mom. My mom is the most artistic person I know; if you ask her to make any craft, she will find a way to do it and make it beautiful, even if she's never done something similar before. I mean, she basically carried my K-6 school projects. And, I would like to think that, as her daughter, I inherited 50% of her crafting ability.

12 years ago, I was a second-grader learning how to write paragraphs. I vividly remember one of our prompts: what did you do over the long three-day (indigenous people's day) weekend. I proudly (and choppily) wrote down the story of my mom making my Halloween costume from scratch. That year, I was going to be a witch. Since I can remember, my mom has created my Halloween costume: a scarecrow in kindergarten, witch in second grade, and a mummy in fifth. We would take a road trip to LA to buy fabric, and she would sit at the sewing machine for a whole weekend to put it together. I felt incredibly special and loved.

However, my crafting ability is… well… questionable. I've always been the person to overcomplicate simple artistic tasks rather than invent clever shortcuts. Perhaps my brain was wired to conceptualize complex ideas and not to exploit a shortcut or loophole. So, while the field of arts and crafts doesn't come naturally to me, I still picked up some things over the years of watching my mom make masterpiece after masterpiece. And, by 2017, I was consuming significant DIY Youtuber content (shout out to LaurDIY and Sarabeautycorner) to compensate.

I quit celebrating Halloween after 2016 (felt too old 😔). But, I decided to make a comeback this year for Barbie (years of playing with Barbies have led me to this moment). And, when I found that my costume was way too long for my short legs, I realized it was time to unlock and relive part of my childhood and bring out the sewing kit.

So, here's a blog post on how I made my Halloween costume suitable for my 5'1 (155 cm) self. I wouldn't call this a tutorial since I was kind of experimenting and being risky; I would describe it as a summary of a journey.

When I tried on my costume in my dorm, I realized it was VERY long. So, I had two options: buy a pair of platform heels to compensate for my shortness. Or, cut it. As a somewhat poor college student, I decided scissors was the way to go. I didn't have a plan for how much I wanted to cut; the pants were bell bottoms, so it was hard to tell how much longer than my heels they were.

So, I decided to play it safe and start by cutting an inch.

I gathered my supplies:
1. A 12-inch ruler (shoutout to reaganc)
2. White Crayola Chalk (shoutout to ezrag)
3. A sewing kit: fabric scissors, light pink and red thread, a needle, and sewing pins (shoutout to ezrag and reaganc again)
4. Time and patience (shoutout to me)

I used my ruler to mark several one inch marks along the bottom of each leg.


Then, I went with my chalk and connected the line (eyeballing moment).


Then, I grabbed my fabric scissors and cut along the solid line. I, then, realized that one inch was nowhere near the length I needed to get rid of. So, I decided to cut an extra four inches. After getting comfortable with the fabric and the scissors, I decided to cut four inches in one go. I repeated the same process as before and used the sewing pins to hold the pant leg in place while I cut.


I wanted to add a ½ inch hem, so I used my chalk and ruler again and marked one inch above the bottom.


And, I went in and handsewed the hem using my light pink thread! I, now, had a significant difference in leg length!


I repeated this process on the other leg.

I had A LOT of leftover fabric, and I was feeling very crafty. Suddenly, I channeled my inner 70s girl and thought of adding ruffles to the bells to make them more ✨. I cut five strips of fabric per pant leg (each one inch in height). Then, I used a straight stitch to make the wave-like ruffles.


I pinned the ruffles to the area of the leg I wanted to sew it into. Then, I went in with my needle and thread and sewed it in by attaching the ruffle to the fabric in the valleys of the ruffle. I added one ruffle at the hem and four along the bell. I used chalk to mark where I was going to sew them, to make sure they were leveled. This part took a lot of patience since it was quite repetitive, but I am in love with the finished product!


While I didn't make my entire Barbie costume from scratch, I am very proud of myself for making lemonade out of lemons! Further, this was a craft that was feasible in my freetime (I am a full-time college student). Although I missed having my mom with me to help me, I am just happy that I am carrying along the DIY Halloween tradition.