I shaped the front to have a little point as a fun accent. Here is a pic of me and Maddie, my Thor "brother" in this costuming adventure.  She too used wonderflex and shaped wings to attach as her interpretation of Thor's helm. Follow her costuming adventure at her blog - Not Another Geek Girl

Once sewn together I added the green skirt material to the inside of the collar. To the right, Kami Jacobs is saving my ass by sewing in the zipper. It runs full length of the front of the coat and was totally defeating me. She's a professional and the zipper looks great!

I also added green fabric flair at the shoulder and as a waist band.

To finish the skirt I had to add a zipper (this one was a little easier), add a hook closure in the waist band and hem the skirt.

My friend - the Serger - sealed the fraying edges of the skirt before hemming.

I also decided I wanted to make two sizes, just to see what would work better with the Loki dress. I started with wooden poplar dowels at 1/2", and 1" in diameter.

I knew I wanted to make it glow, so a light source was one the first things I needed to figure out. I wanted to keep the staff compact, so many of the LED ideas were ruled out based on the battery size needed to power them. I settled on flashlights as a compact and easy to deal with light source. The light is already made to be focused in one direction, and a decent amount of lumens can be packed into a small flashlight. Since I'd have to make the walking stick parts fit around the flashlight, I went for the smaller, but still bright lights.

Once I chose to use Flashlights as a light source, I worked to find the fittings that would fit around them. (I wanted to be able to remove the flashlights in order to replace batteries and so that the staff could be broken down into smaller parts.)  I then went back and forth between the plumbing section and the electrical section looking at PVC fittings. The electrical section had better fitting pieces (grey pvc on the right.) The heads of the staff are electrical boxes.

One of the parts of the staff that took me the longest to figure out was the blue stone in the center.

I wandered Michaels, JoAnns, Lowes, Walmart, Target, Hobby shops, Etsy, eBay...all looking for the right stone.  To the left is what I ended up bringing home. Let's see, we've got Chandelier replacement crystals, vintage glass stoppers to decanters (my mom sent me these), colored glass beads and squares, Glass containers, bits of safety glass I obtained... um... somewhere... okay, moving on...What worked by far the best was real stone - polished quartz crystal cylinders. They catch the light the best. (where I got the stones? - eBay)

Alright, so I had the parts and to the left you can see how the crystals glow with the light from the flashlights.

The next step was figuring out how to make these parts look less like dowels and electrical PVC fittings and more like an ancient weapon of awesome proportions.

Time to get out the Dremel...

I also got to be fashionable while working on cutting and shaping the PVC in the shed out back...

Here's my awesome set up in my Loki's Lair...apparently Loki weedeats...and golfs...and uses box fans.

Here are the two sets of tops for the walking sticks. Once I was done coating myself in PVC dust (don't worry I had on my PPEs - Personal Protection Equipment) I then glued the pieces together.

Once glued, it was time to spray paint. I started with a dark gunmetal grey and then sprayed a metallic bronze over it, to try for some depth and shadows. It wasn't hugely successful for what I was trying for, but I am still happy with the look. To the left is the smaller walking stick and to the right is the larger.

Here are a few additional pictures so you can see how it screws together and where the flashlight goes.


I crammed -I mean gently placed- the blue lighting gel (plastic sheet) inside the head of the staff between the crystal and the flashlight. I did not glue it in place in case I ever wanted to use a different color. The gel's are made to take the heat from professional lighting, so I was fairly confident the flashlight wouldn't melt the plastic.

(Below) To secure the crystal in the head of the staff, I took some jewelry wire, wound it around the crystal and secured it through holes I bored in the plastic of the staff head.

Now, since the sheet fabric is a simple cotton, I needed to reinforce it so it would hold up well over the girls, and by the girls I mean my ta-tas.  I cut equal sized pieces of duck cloth and denim, but any thicker, tough fabric will do. (I didn't do this for the skirt, because I wanted the fabric to be light and flow well.)

To the right is the reverse side of the top of the dress, the Duck and the Denim.

Then, it was time to sew...

With the top together it was time to make the skirt. I ended up not having wide enough fabric to cut the full length of the skirt, so I added on a red cotton stripe to make the dress as long as preferred.  Again, I went with a circle skirt.

Say Hello to my little friend...the Serger. Sergers are like the NHL enforcers of the sewing machine world.  They make sure the fabric keeps it together, by weaving 4 threads into a strong stitch along the edge of the fabric. This is especially important for fabrics that fray easily like brocades and silks.  It is also a good idea just to finish any edge, so I did so here with the edge of the skirt.

Once the top and the skirt were sewn together I added the red strip to the bottom and the top. All I had left was to add shoulder straps...

Throw a petticoat underneath the skirt...

Add in a red belt, red shoes, red hair band, red bangle and red earrings and we are accessorized!

First step was to make the base of the petticoat.  I made a simple circle skirt out of muslin.

Next I cut blue, green and tan tulle to the length of the dress.

After cutting the tulle I gathered the ends with a zig-zag stitch, which also made it easier to sew them to the circle skirt.