Oz Coz #6 :In the Roar…

Time for the lion suit!  Although the two kids laying the lion have a height difference of about 6″, I decided to go with a shared costume, which surprisingly worked, as the girl had longer legs, the boy had longer torso, it averaged out fine!

I found some nice lion-coloured fleece on eBay for a reasonable price [that stuff is NOT cheap but £5.99/m seemed OK] and we got 3m.  I located a free adult size onesie pattern on Instructables and printed,  assembled, and cut it out at school during some free time.  I JUST squeaked the required length out of the 3m.

I ditched pockets and cuffs, and decided to make the hood separately [you’ll see why]

I like that this is not too voluminous, although I did hack a little extra width into the upper body, tapering back into the legs, as the larger student is a fairly big lad!

The zip went in easily…but didn’t really.  After whizzing it in, I found that the fleece had oozed out of its fold and was gaping everywhere.  It didn’t play nicely, and took a fair bit of faffing until it gave in to me.  I should have just basted the bloody thing, more haste less speed and all that.

I managed to utilise a convenient bit of scrap selvedge to make a tail, snipping  a bit of ratty wig to make the tuft.   I gave it some body with some garden wire before stuffing it, and after a fair bit of thought and experimentation extended the wire onto a belt which has to be fastened under the onesie to brace the tail into shape.  This had to be repaired SO MANY times it drove me mad, they kept yanking the wire out of the tail.  Gah!

I had found FIVE ratty brown wigs in the props cupboard, and after  a good wash [they were disgustingly dusty] they were fit to handle.  Definitely ratty and tatty, and unsalvageable for wiggery, they worked well to chop up and mount on the hood to make an impressive mane.  It  fastens to the onesie with a few press studs, so can be swapped into different animal costumes with just a ‘hat’ change.  Fifteen quid well spent!

Fake paws stay in place by means of good old elastic loops, and hey presto!  King of the fffffforest!

Lion #1 [girl]

Lion #2 [boy]

I think the face paint rendered them unrecognisable online, so I didn’t blank THOSE out The paws worked really well, and I didn’t need the elastic foot stirrup after all.

GRRRR-OWL