DIY Pikachu Fan Trainer Costume: Pokemonbounding Episode 3

     For the third installment in my Pokemonbounding series and my look for Day 2 of Pokemon GO Fest, I decided to take a stab at the Pikachu Fan trainer costume, which is a look based on this in-game avatar outfit:

If you've been following my craft blog for a while, you may recall that I made some Pikachu ears a couple of years ago.  In that post, I mentioned wanting to recreate the Pikachu Fan trainer costume at some point in time.  I did buy a shirt for that look, but at the time, I didn't get around to finishing it.  When I was thinking about my second GO Fest look, I remembered the Pikachu Fan trainer costume, and decided to see if I could finish the look.
     If you're wanting to make the ears, check out this blog post.  For the rest of the look, I have a video tutorial where I make a Pokeball keychain to go on my belt loop, as well as a failed attempt at a Pikachu image to adorn my shirt.  I ended up remedying that issue for GO Fest by using cardstock instead of vinyl for Pikachu.
     Here's the video tutorial.  Keep scrolling for the templates as well as more outfit pics and a discussion of Day 2 of GO Fest.

Templates

Here is the Pikachu template I mention in the video:

And here is the Pokeball template:

The Outfit and Pokemon GO Fest Day 2

     This is the original outfit I was starting from.  Even without the extra frills, I think it works reasonably well as a Pikachu Fan trainer look.

     This is the second iteration of the outfit, with my poor, faceless Pikachu which you can't even really see because it blends in with my shirt.  The video explains what happened to Pikachu, but the short of it is that the glue I chose didn't adhere well to vinyl.

     Finally we arrive at the GO Fest version of the look.  My Pikachu decal I made from cardstock, and it started raining basically every time I stepped out to take a picture, so I wasn't able to wear it much.  But I think the shirt looks fine without it, so that wasn't a big deal.
     I swapped out the shorts for a pair I liked better and the heels for more sensible sneakers.  I think I'd like to try this again sometime, but I'd like to get yellow laces for my sneakers to pull the look together a bit more.  Also, my socks have Pokeballs on them, but you can't see that under my sneakers, so I'd probably opt for yellow or black socks if I did this look again.
     By the time GO Fest Day 2 rolled around, I was a little tuckered out.  I'm not super into the battle aspect of Pokemon GO, so I didn't love the rocket research focus, but I did manage to get the shadow birds and Mewtwo to add to my shadow mon collection, so that was pretty cool.  I also nabbed another six shinies, including a shiny Alolan Marowak, which I had been wanting for a while.
     All in all, I enjoyed Pokemon GO Fest 2020.  I hope that in the future GO Fest will retain a virtual component, so that those of us who can't travel can still participate.  I'd also love it if they gave us new printables each year, because those were a lot of fun.  I plan to write up a post on my GO Fest decorations sometime in the not too distant future, so if you're curious to see that, stay tuned!