3 Quick and Easy Costumes
Since Thanksgiving and Christmas tend to be my big holidays, Halloween usually sneaks up on me. I am not a big fan of all the death, grim reaper, cemetery scary part of Halloween. I am a HUGE fan of cute costumes though, especially cute costumes I can make at home.
Side Note: Please excuse these photos as they are almost 30 years old. If I had known at the time what a blog was or that I would be doing one, I wouldn’t have cut up the photos for my photo album. And also, give me a break, these were probably taken with the 1st generation digital camera that bragged that it could take 3 mega pixel photos.
When my daughters were growing up we tried hard to stick to costumes that were original or homemade with little to no sewing involved. So I have some tips and tricks for taking the stress out of Halloween costuming. The most important one is: Keep it simple.
Baby Lamb
If you have an infant and just cannot wait to dress her up in a costume, I suggest a baby lamb. Get an inexpensive white footed one piece pajama, a white knit cap and glue cotton balls all over them. Then, for the hooves, get 2 pairs of black baby socks for the feet and hands. That’s all!! The black socks helps keep her from pulling at the cotton balls and putting them in her mouth. But still be vigilant - this is not a totally babyproof costume.
In fact, I need to tell you right now that none of these costumes are totally babyproof. Use your common sense and for goodness sakes, keep an eye on your child when he or she is wearing a homemade costume.
2. Bumblebee
An easy toddler costume is a Bumble Bee. Get black leggings and black oversized t-shirt, and some yellow felt. Cut the felt in fat strips, about 4” tall and glue them on the t-shirt in rows. Grab a headband and bend the ends of two pipe cleaners around the head band and stick a small styrofoam ball on top of each. You can color the balls first with a sharpie or paint them with gold craft paint. For the wings, take a wire coat hanger, untwist it, shape it into 2 circles and wrap the wire with black electrical tape. Then cover the entire thing with something yellow. I used that cling wrap that comes in fun colors and chose yellow. You could also cover the wings with masking tape and then color the tape with highlighters. Or you could use gold washi tape. To attach the wings to the child, I cut two lengths of black elastic that was long enough to tie at the center of the wings and loop around the child’s armpit/shoulder area. Use black elastic because it blends in with the black tshirt. I also put a smaller t-shirt on them under the bumble bee shirt so I could stuff baby pillows (or stuffing) in the front and back under that shirt and tuck it into the leggings so the pillow would stay in place.
3. Ladybug
Ladybug is another easy costume. Get a yard of red felt, a yard of red ribbon and about 12” of black felt. Cut the red felt in a circle and cut from the edge to the center to make a cape. Be sure and cut out some at the center for the neck hole. To keep the cape in place, cut small slits towards the top corners by the neck, thread a red ribbon through the slit on each side and tie a knot. The two ribbons can now be tied together when the cape is on. Cut a slit up the back from the bottom of the cape about half way to the neck. This gives the look of wings. Cut circles from the black felt about 5” in diameter (or whatever size looks right for your child’s size) and glue them on. Make the antennae from a headband and pipe cleaners and styrofoam balls as described in the Bumble Bee costume above. A black turtleneck and leggings complete the outfit.