Halloween

Halloween is so much fun! Dressing up is exciting for kids and adults. Let’s not forget about trick or treating! The excitement of being out after dark, seeing everyone dressed up, and getting candy, makes you wish Halloween came more than once a year!

In the sewing world Halloween can be quite the event. If you choose to sew a costume you have to prepare in advance, and put in a lot of work. There is always a debate on which costumes are better, store bought or homemade.

Here are some costumes from the past, sewn at home, store bought, and just put together with odds and ends that were available. At the end you can decide for yourself which ones are the best.

One year Mia wanted to be Raggedy Ann. My mom got to work sewing her costume with this pattern. I couldn’t sew clothes at that time, so my mom had to do all of the work on this one, but of course, Grandma Sue wouldn’t say no to Mia. HA!

Mia opted to wear her hair in braids instead of getting the classic red wig that Raggedy Ann wears. So she was more of a “rag doll” than being specifically Raggedy Ann. David was Alfalfa from the Little Rascals. He wore store bought clothes, and I sprayed his hair black and styled it in the iconic Alfalfa hairdo. Eddie was Spiderman in a store bought costume.

Oh, and of course David couldn’t be Alfalfa without some freckles! None of his classmates knew who he was, but the adults did.

That evening Mia met up with Grandma Joyce. She had taken odds and ends that she had at home and put them together to be a cowboy.

Halloween is for everyone, so here’s a picture of Pinkie in her rabbit costume. She was not happy about it!

Store bought costumes can be a lot of fun and a great option if you have a bunch of kids that want to dress up. Here is a great example of that! It’s Michael, Summer, Ryan and Shelby all dressed up like KISS. I can’t imagine how much work would have to go into making each of these costumes at home!

Grandma Joyce, again was wearing odds and ends from around her house to make herself a pirate.

Back to those KISS costumes though. Those plastic masks from back in the day barely had air holes, and were uncomfortable! Paired with the plastic suits they were the original sauna suits! Unless it was a cold Halloween, then they offered no protection and you froze your little plastic butt off!

I do wish they still had the costumes though. I got curious and looked them up. An “in the box” Ace Frehley is for sale on eBay for $999!

Why would I want to be Mork From Ork for Halloween? Who knows, but I remember this costume, and it’s restrictive breathing. Guess that’s why I opted to put it on my head for a photo! Na-No, Na-No!

Those plastic masks were slowly smothering children long before I was born, Ha! Just check out this picture featuring Aunt Joylana as some sort of Princess, Aunt Tamy as Tweety Bird. I don’t think that Tweety mask even has nose holes!

One year Mia, David and Mateo decided to do a group costume. These costumes were a little bit store bought, a little bit odds and ends that they already had, and a homemade “LaFawnduh” sign. They were a big hit and had lots of fun at school that day!

Kira looked cute and scary one year as a classic vampire. I love the details, that she even had to have her nails painted! That’s my girl!

One year for Halloween, Mia wanted to be Cinderella. I made her this apron that looks like “Cinderella while she’s cleaning”. I was pretty proud of it, I whipped it up without a pattern.

That same year David went with a classic Chris Farley character! I bought the jacket at a second hand store, and everything else was odds and ends from around the house.

Mia’s costume was so fun that Elizabeth decided to wear it one year to Disneyland’s Halloween Party.

A Stepsister even loved it, or maybe she thought Elizabeth was going to clean something for her and got excited.

Elizabeth liked how comfortable the costume was, and how cute it was, so she decided to wear it again this year! This time she made a hair tie out of some old fabric that she had. She decided to take some action shots around her apartment before she left for Disneyland. (I do have a blog, so we all have to take picture of everything!) She set about getting some cleaning done before her party!

Or maybe this costume makes you feel like cleaning!

Either way there was tons of things for this Cinderella to do!

Making a new dress for the ball? I hope no mice are involved! HA!

The costume was, again, good enough to catch the attention of not one, but both of the Stepsisters. This time they stopped to verbally abuse her! That’s a win in my book! HA!

Costumes can be homemade and not sewn. Baby Luka was adorable as Dobby from “Harry Potter”, in this crocheted hat that my mom made for him.

There is also no sewing required for a themed tutu, but it still counts as homemade. Only Mia’s Wonder Woman shirt was purchased. Of course, so was David’s Hanibal Lecter mask. (He couldn’t breathe good out of that either.)

So which type of costumes are your favorite, home made, store bought, or odds and ends? To me it doesn’t matter. I like costumes that are creative, and that make the wearer feel excited for Halloween. There is something about the old plastic masks that I like, must be the nostalgia. I also like the home made costumes with beautiful detail. Let’s not forget though, costumes like Eddie’s Spiderman that came with fake muscles sewn in, which made him feel like the real Spiderman.

Whichever you prefer, have a great, and safe Halloween! (Make sure you can breathe in your costume!)

As for me, onto the next!