I made a half circle skirt for the skirt lining. (You can also see my Fall Flower Fairy dress for more about making circle skirts.) Simply cut out a piece of fabric the length you want the tail and twice as wide as you want your tail, plus an inch of seam allowance.

So, even though I still had all the ears to make and Sophia’s hoodie to finish, I began cutting out lining fabric for a half circle skirt. Fortunately, I had JUST enough soft crinoline left, (I was using it to make Julia a tutu,) to make a bubble overlay in the same style as her fox skirt and the organza skirt I was making for Olivia’s bear costume. Here is a handy circle skirt calculator. Remember, if you are making a HALF circle skirt, you need to put that in the calculator too. Insert triangle wire shapes into ears and set aside while you make the cover for your headband. Step 4. Cut out cover for headbandThis will not be too much of a problem with a stretch fabric. But for a faux fur that does not stretch, like the fur I used for Sophia’s Panda Bear costume, I had to make sure she could get them on and off. Once your wire ear frames are inside your plush ears, fold up the bottom of the ears, trimming excess fabric if necessary. While I used my sewing machine when I created this cat costume for my thirteen-year-old niece, Julia, you can sew it by hand if you don’t have a sewing machine. You don’t even need a glue gun!

A super effective way to turn a fabric tube inside out is to make a small snip in the fabric at one of the open ends, then slip a hairpin/bobby pin over that little piece of fabric and insert into tube. My niece Julia is thirteen now and Susan, my mom, and I were a little traumatized by how grown up she looked! Where did our baby Julia go?!? Draw a simple template for your cat ears on paper. Basically, you just need to draw a triangle that extends down about an inch at the bottom.You can make the cover in the same plush you are using for your ears, or you can use another soft fabric that isn’t as fluffy. I cut our fabric 9″x8″. I had extra room because our fabric was so stretchy, so after fitting on Julia’s tiny hands, I restitched them to make them smaller. Problem: When you insert a bendable wire or a wire clothes hanger to mold and bend your tail, the wire tends to twist around inside the tail but the tail does not stay put. We used the hook closures for the fox and bear organza skirts and we planned to do it for this one too. But we ran out of time!

As you did with the gloves, you need to make sure you have enough width in your design to accommodate getting your piece on and off. After she finished one row of stitching, and everything looked good, she made another row of stitches to help the ribbon laying flat and keep it from turning up.

More DIY Halloween Costumes for Girls

With hand stitches, begin to sew your ears onto the headband, taking care to put your stitches through the fabric on the top and bottom of the headband cover and also catching the bottom of the wire ear frame. The fabric I used to line the skirt was just a basic lining fabric from the clearance bin. It was a woven — no stretch. So I had to make sure I accommodated for that in my sizing. If your fabric is soft and “floppy,” you will probably need to make some sort of an insert to hold up your ears.

Over the years, I have made more animal ears than I can count. I have made various kinds of cat ears, bunny ears, bat ears, fox ears, fawn ears, and unicorn ears.

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If your plush fabric or faux fur is quite fluffy, then I recommend using a thinner fabric for the headband cover. Honestly, I just want to wear these fingerless gloves and leg warmers/boot cuffs every day. They are super cozy. (I think I might steal the gloves and add them to my camera bag to keep my hands warm while I photograph in the winter.) Expert Tip: Want to know a secret? I often just SAFETY PIN tails on to costumes once my child is already in it. Easy peasy. How to Make a Bendable Cat Tail