My son outgrew his previous Ren Fest costume but now he's old enough to have opinions so I could make just anything. The only way I was able to convince him on a pirate costume was if he got to be a ghost pirate with green face paint and the jolly roger had to match the Defcon poster we have in our basement. He's apparently been exposed to that poster more than other pirate iconography, therefore the smiley face pirate is the true pirate. He's also obsessed with the made-for-TV movie Scooby Doo Pirates Ahoy, hence the ghost pirate requirement. He was pretty cute and he ended up with a pretty good haul of trinkets that random people gave him. He had a lot of fun growling at people too.
I'm happy with how the vest and hat all came together. The vest was made from parts of an old pair of black jeans. I bought the hat and glued the patch on. The embroidery on the vest was done directly on the denim, the hat patch I did on felt. I'm most proud of that Defcon jolly roger that I created from scratch using inkstitch open source software since I've never done that before. And the bias binding was a great finishing touch. The Kid even wore the hat all day! I assumed I'd have to carry it (I did have to carry his wooden sword on my belt).
The weather at the festival was perfect this year.
