Do you make Halloween costumes for your kiddos?
 

When my son was smaller, one of our favorite things was planning what he was going to be for Halloween. Since I made all his costumes, we would spend time right after his birthday, which was in August, talking about what he thought would be fun and what I had the imagination and skill to pull off. A lot of time, thought and giggles went into his costumes.

I think the most creative one we ever did was a school zone sign that actually flashed. He won a few contest with it and I was stopped numerous times while we were tricker treating by people wanting to know where we had got it. Plus it was pretty safe too. lol

Our biggest fail was a piece of candy corn. It just didn't wow us in the end. Even my dad called it a dud. LOL

Another nice benefit to making the costumes was making them warm enough for an Erie, PA Halloween. Sometimes we had snow!

Finally, it was also fun to pass them on to my cousins' kids. The kids all wanted to wear them. Of course, I lost track of them years ago, but they could still be being used because my younger cousins are still having kids. That's the wonder of a large family, 75 first cousins you all, it never stops growing.

Part of me wishes I had kept them for future grandkids, but another part thinks my son and I will have fun planning with them in the future, so it is all good.

So do you make costumes? If so, I would love to hear about it. What's your process? Favorite and any duds of your own? lol

We don't do halloween here in the netherlands, even though we do watch halloween movies and snacks but not trick or treating.
But I seriously always LOVE to see what my friends come up with who do celebrate in their country and are all dressed and such.

That's a big no from me. Like Wendy, we don't really do Halloween here. On the rare time the kids did go trick or treating we just dressed them up as fairies or princesses, depending on what dressup clothes they already had in their toyboxes. I do like seeing what everyone else does though. I saw a super cute 2 year old on facebook the other day dressed up as a Costco employee sample tester. Sooooo cute!

I never did since I never had kids but I have a cousin whose husband thought up costumes every year for the annual Parade of the Hills that was held in their town in August. Their oldest son joined his dad when he was small and continued on into adulthood.

Sadly, that 39 year tradition ended unexpectedly when the son died unexpectedly in July. Dad just couldn't handle doing it without him even though he had before he ever had the children.

One of them that I enjoyed seeing photos of was the year they went as dog catchers. A stray dog ended up on their property and hung around... having a littler of puppies in July. They never found the dog's owner so they kept it and that year they used the parade to find homes for the puppies.

My mom always made our costumes because she loved Halloween and could sew really well. I remember going to the fabric store, picking out patterns and fabric so she could make me the perfect costume. I love Halloween but can't really sew that well. My son is 16 now, so we are about at the point where he is too old, but when he was younger, I did at least try to really think about planning out cool costumes. We were fortunate enough that we got to go to Disney a few times during Halloween because my husband had a conference in the area. I put special thought into those costumes, and a couple were a big hit. One year Caleb was the Joker. Instead of the mask, I did a fairly good job of painting his face, and I was batgirl. Another year, he went as a box of popcorn(cutest costume ever) and I made a shirt for myself, using my cricut machine for all the lettering, with a box of popcorn on the front with handsewn popcorn kernels, and on the back it said, "popcorn 5 cents". We got so many comments about how cute our costumes were. I probably spent $100 and 80 man hours making my t-shirt, but it was so stinking cute that it was worth it.

I never made my kids' costumes. I grew up with homemade costumes and wanted a store bought costume more than anything so I found it easier to let the kids pick out what they wanted to be and then find the costumes in the store (or eBay, etc.). We usually picked out costumes after Halloween for the following year and I'd get them on clearance.

I agree that it is fun to see what people come up with. I am always amazed by how imaginative some people are.

That sounds adorable, but I have to admit, I have never been to Costco, so I really have no idea what a sample tester looks like. lol

Oh, I am sorry about the passing of your cousin's son. What a sad thing it is to lose anyone and I can't imagine how devastating it would be to lose a child.

But it sounds like a wonderful tradition while they shared it and the such a cleaver way to find homes for those puppies.

That sounds adorable Corey. It may have been a lot of money and work, but it sounds like it paid off not only in comments, but in fun at the time and a great memory to treasure. I would agree that something like that is very much worth it.

That is a super smart way to do it Sherri. I would have never thought that far ahead.

It seems that we always want what we don't have when we are small, no matter how well we have it. Probably when we are grown too. I wanted a mom who did what my young self defined as "mom things" so I became that mom to my son.

I did make many of my son's costumes when he was a kid; not usually fully, but I would find pieces that would work for later things, too. Like sewing onto sweatsuits or finding pjs that worked for part. Some of the best ones were a deer hunter, a knight, and a robot. I don't think any were duds.

Lucky you not having a dud! LOL Putting one together from found parts is always a great idea and I did that when I could. Makes it so much easier too.

We mostly bought or put together costumes from things they already owned. Once in a while I made or embellished when we couldnt find what we wanted for a reasonable price, but that was mostly easy things like decorating a too-plain witch's hat for my daughter or making a costume from a cardboard box when my son wanted to go as a Rubik's cube. I came from a family where we always created costumes from things we had around the house, and I remember wanting store-bought costumes as a kid so that's what I did for my kids.

More proof that it seems we do for our kids what we wanted growing up. That Rubik's cube sounds like a cute idea!

When Lucas was little I did for a few years, he actually stopped going out for halloween fairly young because he prefered handing out the candy instead of going to get it (he also clued in to the fact we don't get a lot of kids on our street so often had leftover candy lol)

I do NOT sew so my costume making was more crafting out of boxes than anything.

https://i.imgur.com/XvSOTRL.jpg

He was a robot, fireman, lego batman and then luigi from luigi's mansion - luigi costume was premade but we did the accessory for it

Boxes are amazing for creating costumes, aren't they? I sew, but am not great at it, so I did a lot of "crafting" too.

I think, in the end, that it is less about the costume, and more about the time spent together working on it. Seems that all the sweetest Halloween memories have very little to do with candy collecting. :)

Not so much Halloween costumes but I make my kids costumes for Book Week which is a big parade all around Australia here that every school does. Then usually they can reuse them for Halloween (which isn't much of a big deal here in Australia).

Here are a few of our past creations...

https://scontent-syd2-1.xx.fbcdn.net...9w&oe=63749409

https://scontent-syd2-1.xx.fbcdn.net...EA&oe=6373FD33

https://scontent-syd2-1.xx.fbcdn.net...ng&oe=63751E86

Kristin & Flergs, SO CUTE!! Lorie, I want to see pictures of some of your creations.

I HATE Halloween. Not celebrating Halloween is literally one of my favorite parts of living overseas! We're home this year, and at ten, it's probably Ari's last time to dress up for Halloween (glory to God!), so I let her buy the costume of her dreams (alien). I even hate spirit week at school. Things that require creativity make me feel so stressed out.

Those are awesome costumes, Flergs.

Kristin, yours are fabulous too. I didn't see them earlier because I was posting from work and a lot of the image don't come through when I do that.

Kellie, I will see if I can find any, but to be honest, he was little back in the day of cameras and film, neither which I could afford at the time. I am sure someone in the family took photos, but I don't have them. Still, I will look.

Homemade costumes are the best .... but, I've never managed to get myself mobilized early enough to make anything cool, so my kids have always had some version of store-bought costumes.

Yall are so talented!
My creativity stretches to a t-shirt with 504 Costume not found, my kid with names all over him as Identity Theft and the Zombie last year. I am not a huge fan of the dressing up esp here in Texas. The costumes are hot and masks are misreable.

I've never made a Halloween costume. There are so many great costumes out there I could never compete with making one. Plus it would take me forever, stress me out and I would get complaints for sure, so why give me a headache when I can just go buy one lol

I never put a mask on him because I think they are dangerous especially at night, and yes they are hot. The Identity Theft costume was so cleaver. I would never have thought of that.

There are merits to purchasing a costume for sure, but for my son and I the entire process was fun, not stressful, which makes a big difference. I'd imagine it can be just as fun to pick out a costume at the store or on line together. The key word is together. :)

Time management is not my strong point, which is why we started in August. LOL

I used to for my daughter. Then she decided she wanted to do her own.... then I resorted to making treat bags and with the exception of this year, I was kicked to the curb on that too!!! LOL. Teenagers!!!

We have done both, depending on his choice and my energy levels. My favorite that we put together was a robot costume. And the mummy was pretty cool too! When he wanted to be Darth Vader and an Oompa Loompa, though, we bought those.

We don't do store costumes, but we don't "make" them either! It's mostly buying a few pieces to create what we want and mixing it with items we already own to create a costume. We have a large tote of all our past "dress up" items and many times we will just mix and match.

For the last couple years we have done Trunk or Treat at our Church, so our costumes have matched our theme. Last year we were country/farmers so we wore flannel and overalls or denim and cowboy hats. We have done tropical/Island (my husband bought a shark onesie for that one), Star Wars (we created our own costumes and had fun making guns and a Storm Trooper helmet), Alice In Wonderland (that was one of my favorites. We made a toadstool seat that we still use when we need extra seating at our table).

We are not in agreement for this year. Either Alice in Wonderland again, or Jurassic Park.

Halloween costumes is one thing I absolutely loved doing for my kids!!! I craft and sew. Here are some of the ones I’ve made.

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...007640351b.jpg
The lion costume 3 out of my 4 wore and it’s probably my favorite and it was my first costume to make. It was actually featured in BabyCenter dot com in like 2003 or 2004. I made all of these except the pink Sleeping Beauty dress (but I did embellish it) and the three Wildcat cheer leader costumes. My little mermaid only has one arm in her sleeve cause she fell Halloween morning and broke her collarbone.

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...ca2dfb5772.jpg
Most of the fancy princess dresses and Dorothy costumes were worn by at least two kiddos. We were all M&Ms one year. And my daughters (with my help) made the Jesse and Big Bird and Cookie Monster ones.

I’m pretty good at making costumes from sweatsuits, pillow cases T-shirts and Jammies. Lol

I usually just do a simple tee shirt costume (Care bear, crayon, pumpkin, etc) but this year I made this.
https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...c5cad49a1.jpeg
I have a brown top to go under and will probably just wear brown boots.


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