The sweater was made by cutting up a thrifted sweater, tailoring it, and adding the white details with some extra knit fabric I already had in my stash.

The blue shirt was thrifted and only needed slight tailoring to fit me better. Except I forgot to do it and it stayed safety-pinned in the back. o/

Both bows were made from satin + ribbon and have the proper attachments on the back.

The skirt ended up being the difficult part of this costume. I was very picky about fabric - I wanted plaid that didn't have yellow in it. Turns out that is nearly impossible to find, unless you want a very Christmasy-looking plaid. I tried dyeing a passable white plaid I found at SAS, but I wasn't sure of its poly/cotton content, so I dyed it using both kinds of dyes. The dye took but it didn't turn out evenly or as bright as I wanted. A few days before ALA I scored on some flannel at Joanns. (yes, it's flannel and yes, it has a yellow stripe, but it was $2 a yard. No complaints from me.) I hit yet another snag with the ruffles - I didn't have enough pre-made ruffles lying around and I didn't really have time to make more, so I bought a bunch of ugly silver lame + organza trim from SAS (I swear to you, it was the least offensive option) and shoved that through my machine hours before I left. (I flipped the trim over so the lame faces inward - it's much less ugly that way.) Even though I rushed to make it, it still has a proper waistband and closures so yay for me. (Hem is ugly as hellll though lmao)

WIP photos and explanations here: http://luluko.tumblr.com/tagged/makoto-kikuchi