Upside Down Scarecrow Costume

My 7 year old daughter was very indecisive this year when choosing what she wanted to be for Halloween. I think she changed her mind at least 4 times, but when she finally decided on the upside down scarecrow we ALL knew this was IT! We saw some scarecrows in the stores and started to see them pop up in yards around our neighborhood which gave her the idea of being a scarecrow, but we love to be creative and think outside of the box so we had to put our own little spin on the traditional scarecrow. We thought why not a silly scarecrow who walks on her hands or does flips for candy!!!! We started out by making a plan of just how we were going to put the whole thing together so that it would give the illusion as if she was walking on her hands with her legs up in the air. She is only 7 so we needed something light enough for her to wear and nothing that involved her holding two poles for the legs in the air all night ;) We needed something easy to walk in and see out of so that she could still walk house to house trick-or-treating, because for the kids its all about the candy anyways. We decided we would make a harness out of light weight 1" pvc pipe and build it so that it would arch over her shoulders down her back and down her chest in the front kind of like the ones the drummers in a marching band wear to hold their drums. We would then put a T joint on her shoulders that would serve as the base for the pvc pipe legs. We had to play a bit with the length of the legs...too tall and she would be top heavy, too short and it just wouldn't look right. We also had to play with the length of the harness down her back and down her front. It was the stabilizer for the legs so we didn't want too much pressure on any one part of her body ie. shoulders, back, tummy. We made it go all they way down to right above her hips. This gave her plenty of support and distributed the weight evenly throughout the core of her body. We had originally decided to just glue the scarecrow head onto the collar of the shirt but after a couple of trial runs we found out it would be too loose and could get ripped off as she walked so we went back to the drawing board and added a T joint to the horizontal bar that went across the front of her hips we then shoved a 1/2" piece of pvc pipe into the head and hot glued it, so now we had a head on a stick :) we glued the stick into the T joint of the harness so that it would not move and would be stable. The rest is just decoration. We went searching the local good will and thrift stores for the perfect flannel shirt. My daughter wanted to make sure everyone knew she was a girl so it had to be a girlie looking scarecrow. We knew the flannel shirt was going to have to be big because she was going to put her legs in the arms of the shirt and we would be stuffing it full of fluff to form the body. There were plenty of Large men's shirts but it was a little harder to find a woman's shirt. When we came across this pink/orange/brown/green plaid shirt we knew it was perfect. We couldn't find a pair of old Bibs that were big enough so We had to break down and hit the local Wally World and buy a pair. We originally bought a size 40x32 but after we got it home and put them over my daughter in the harness we found they would have to be much bigger. We exchanged them for a size 46x32 and they fit perfect. I did cut about 5" off the legs of the pants to fit the length of the pvc pipe "legs". I had a great time at the local fabric store picking out pieces of fabric for the patches. I found a piece of iridescent orange fabric it was very light weight and see through. I like that it was iridescent on one side because when you looked at it from the front all you could see was shiny orange texture but from the back (were she would be looking out from) it was completely see through! I went home and put the harness on then the bibs over the top and found out where her face was located and drew a square on the bibs so I knew where to cut the hole for her face. I then cut out the square and sewed the see through patch on top of the hole I had cut. I embellished the rest of the pants with patches. Hint I just ironed on the rest of the patches to save time. I had some fabric bond paper here at the house so I just ironed that on the back put the patches where I wanted them pulled the paper backing off the patch and ironed it onto the bibs. For the shirt of the scarecrow. I actually sewed a pair of yoga pants into the shirt so my daughter could slip it on easier and it would fit tight. I sewed the cuff of the pants to the arm cuff of the shirt then put stuffing in between the pants and shirt until I got the body formed I then sewed the top of the pants to the bottom of the shirt so that the stuffing was trapped in between and when she pulled the pants up to her waist the shirt would be upside down and be pulled up to her waist and stay up and fit tight. I did have to make a hole in the crotch of the pants so that the stick the head was on could come up through them and attach to the harness. I then glued the head onto the collar of the shirt. I put the finishing touches on the shirt by gluing straw to the inside of the cuffs so it would stick out like it was the stuffing of the scarecrow and so it would help cover her shoes. We used an old pair of garden gloves to cover her shoes. We sewed on two pieces of elastic to the palm of the gloves one to go around the back of her ankle and the other to fit around the bottom of her shoe. We then stuffed the gloves to make them look like there was a real hand in them! To get her in the costume we would first put on the shirt(pants) then put on her shoes and the strapped on the gloves over her shoes, then the harness, plug the head stick into the harness, then put the bibs over the legs and over her whole body. We would buckle the bibs through her legs then used some zip ties to fasten the jeans tight around the pvc legs so they wouldn't slip down. I covered the zip ties with twine ties. We finished it off with putting an old pair of my son's boots on the end of the pipes legs. We did make one modification and added an L bracket to the end of the pvc pipe legs so they would hold on the shoes. It only took us about a week to complete this project but we were under pressure because my daughter had decided on this costume at the last minute. I would recommend you give yourself at least a couple of weeks to cut down on the stress. In the end it was ALL worth it. My daughter LOVED it. Everywhere we went people would go nuts over the upside down scarecrow. My daughter couldn't walk ten steps without someone stopping her for a picture or so they could just get a good look! Even the adults had a hard time figuring out just how she was in there and how she was "walking on her hands"! She won every contest she entered and although they don't have a contest at school all the teachers and parents agreed it was the coolest costume they had ever seen! We got the biggest kick out of seeing her walk around, go up stairs, hills, sit etc. in the costume. She had no problems at all she could see and walk just fine! We would get the funniest looks when we would feed her a piece of candy or give her a drink as we had to go in through the zipper fly or when one of us would talk to her face to face Lol! My mom was rubbing her back but from behind it looked like she was patting her tushy!!! My daughter loved all the attention she got wearing it and even played it up by doing tricks for the crowds of people, like simply lifting one leg so it looked as if she was walking on one hand! This was one of THE best costumes we have ever made and will never forget how much fun we ALL had this Halloween.