I want to make a note for next year: glow stuff is THE BEST HALLOWEEN IDEA EVER. I got a pack of 15 glow bracelets in the Target dollar section for, as you might suspect, a dollar, and I also bought three glow necklaces and a pair of glow glasses. The glow glasses were not a great idea (Paul wore them and looked awesome, but he said they messed with night vision), but the rest of it was great: the kids were SO INCREDIBLY MORE VISIBLE than the kids without glow stuff on. Each kid wore a bracelet on each wrist, and a bracelet on each strap of their trick-or-treat bag, and if I’d thought of it I would have put a bracelet on each ankle as well. (Next year I’ll spend TWO dollars on glow bracelets!) Taking motion photos outdoors at night rarely goes well for anyone, but this gives the GIST of what two kids look like in the dark if they’re wearing some glow stuff:
I had some costume triumphs this year. The best one was Elizabeth’s costume: she wanted to go as Raven from Teen Titans, and I didn’t want to spend $40 on the costume + shipping, so I tried for DIY/homemade. Here’s what Raven looks like (I would like to credit this image, but it is ALL OVER THE PLACE uncredited, so here it is with thanks and credit to whoever it belongs to):
Looking at Raven, I’d say her most important feature, costume-wise, is that cloak. I looked into buying just a cloak, but that was in the “might as well just buy the costume” league of expensive. My mom offered to sew one, but that looked like it was going to end up more expensive and time-consuming than would be worth the savings.
Here’s what we did: I bought a $4 one-size-fits-most blue rain poncho (the kind that comes in a little packet) and cut up the middle allllmost to the top (leaving the neck opening intact). I also ended up cutting a long strip off each side to make the sleeves shorter. It was PERFECT.
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| She’s trying to look crabby like Raven |
For the jeweled belt/brooch, we happened to find some of those big-version flat glass vase-filler things at a consignment store (if I’d thought of using those glass things before seeing them at the consignment shop, I would have looked at a craft store). Paul happened to have four flat round metal things to hot-glue the big red glass things to, but if he hadn’t had those I would have used cardboard painted with gold paint. (And if we hadn’t found the big red glass gems, I would have used circles of red paper, maybe with saran wrap over it for shine.) Then I hot-glued the glass-on-metal-circles to an old belt, which she wore backwards so the buckle wouldn’t show. (There was originally another round thing on that belt, but it fell off and got lost at school.) I glued one more glass-on-metal to a clothespin, which I clipped to the top of the cape-cut as a brooch. (I colored the exposed part of the clothespin with a blue Sharpie.)
She wanted a black leotard, but those are not cheap. Instead I had her wear a black turtleneck and dark navy skirt. She wanted slouchy purple boots; I had her wear her dark turquoise ones. Raven’s skin is grey, so she’s also wearing grey tights and grey gloves we already had (both from Target: tights $4, gloves in a pack of three pairs for $2). I used a $1 tube of white face paint to make her face pale-but-not-clown.
The main disappointment was the hair: Raven’s is blue-purple (it looks VERY PURPLE in the image above, but it’s described as midnight blue), so I bought a $2 can of purple hair spray. It says clearly on it “Cap indicates color.” No, it does not:
It was PINK. Bright pink! The cap is DARK PURPLE! Well. We got over it, but it was disappointing.
(She was compensated by the fact that it DID NOT WASH OUT. So she gets to go to school today with pink hair! Whereas I consider that a second disappointment with the product.)
Also a little disappointing: we forgot to put her jewel sticker on her forehead, which a brother helpfully pointed out when it was too late to do anything about it. But our PLAN was to use a jewel from a Sticky Mosaics set she has; if that wouldn’t stick, I would have used a washable red marker to draw one on.
But what surprised me in general was that it didn’t have to be The Same in order to Look Right: no one is holding up a picture of Raven to compare and then saying, “Wait, her boots are supposed to be PURPLE” or “That skirt looks NAVY.” What’s important is THE GIST.
The other costume struggle-ending-in-success was William’s. He wanted to be Luke Skywalker, but JEDI Luke Skywalker. Which basically looks like a guy wearing black/brown clothes. Since William is 5’4″, I thought we were already pushing the trick-or-treat thing without also making it look like he didn’t bother to dress up. So I made him look more dressed up with a belted brown towel, and I felt like he REALLY DID suddenly look much more in-costume:
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| (I evened up the ends of the towel after seeing this photo) |
The other crucial element was, of course, the sword, which glowed in the dark. It was $8 at Target, but then that was the total cost of the costume. I have been informed that it is The Wrong Color, but there were two color choices, red and blue, so I got blue.
This outfit showed me that Doing Something almost always looks better than Not, even if the Something doesn’t really make Sense. That is: even though the towel is not an accurate representation of any part of a Jedi costume, he still looked MUCH MORE like a Jedi with it than without it.
Those are amazing costumes.
When I saw the picture of Elizabeth (before reading), I thought: I didn’t realize she had red hair! (That poncho was PERFECT.)
Nice work. I like that you had so many back-up ideas. Also I can’t believe your 6th grader is 6 inches taller than mine (and 2 inches taller than me).
I bought glowy stuff in the dollar section this year too. Don’t know why I haven’t done it before…
Oh, Elizabeth just looks so great!
They look great!
We had a similar disappointment with the hair colour. Bart was an Oompa Loompa, so we were going for green hair. In the right light it looked like a dark, mossy green, but certainly not the neon green indicated by the cap.
Great job! I am big into the glowy stuff too. Then the additional fun of taking a “lights out” tub or shower afterward :)
They look great!!
Awesome! And I will keep glow stuff in mind for next year. We did homemade costumes this year, too. They turned out pretty great, too. Sarah was a witch (she wore black velour pants and a purple long sleeve tshirt with a black short sleeve tshirt over it, long black cape and purple and black witch’s hat) and Wes was Harry Potter (too big flannel shirt, plain tshirt underneath, jeans, little round glasses, scar drawn on forehead, wand). Maybe it was a good year for homemade costumes!
My girls carried glow wands this year, but we’ve been loving the glow-in-the-dark stuff at Target, too, for everyday use. Like someone above mentioned, they’re a great bathtub treat. Also, try placing one in a balloon! I’ve set several wands, glasses and bracelets for their Christmas stockings, too, since I’m not sure things other than the bracelets will still be available after Halloween.
The local high school sells glow bracelets to raise money for scholarships, so we bought 100 of those for ten bucks and handed those out instead of candy. The one package lasted us about four years. We felt virtuous in giving out something USEFUL and SAFETY-CONSCIOUS and HEALTHY and also, then we didn’t have delicious chocolate in the house that we’d eat before the holiday even arrived.
Jake wanted to be a Jedi Luke too, but he had to be satisfied with Tattooine Luke because I am completely uncrafty with costumes. I might steal this idea for next year!
Your children are so BLONDE
Grace must of got the same spray. She was sooo excited about having purple hair for Halloween, but it looked sort of pink!
If you sew, though, her costume would’ve been simple, and if you do it right, cheap. (As with everything, you need advance planning and shopping around.) Thing is, Grace’s costume was purchased last year at Target for 90% off. She was a light-up purple bat. I located some purple and black tights for her, and she wore her black boots. But then her preschool insisted on a themed costume, so she went as Rapunzel with the costume I made for her birthday. I did cave and buy the commercial hair, but that needed serious adjustment to fit, because her head was three inches bigger than the Disney hairpiece! Baby sister Nicole was an owlet, which I made that one, too. And truthfully, with shopping with coupons and on sale, wasn’t very expensive.
Lindsay you can get glow stuff at the Dollar store year around. (At least at Dollar Tree you can) It is one of the only things I specifically go to the Dollar Store for!
Bratling- I can sew in the sense that I can sew on a button IF I can see the original button holes. Otherwise, no.
William is 5’4″? I do believe that half your children are taller than me now. LOL.
I love that you made the costumes instead of the spending money on expensive costumes.
I miss those kind of costumes (yours), everything seems so put-together & polished now. Gone are the hobo’s, cats, scarecrows made out of pillow cases & extra clothes it seems.
They are looking grown up! Love the costumes!
Your children! They are looking very grown up. The Jedi costume rocks, I didn’t think for a second the towel was out of place.
As a costume hobbyist, I have to say I am duly impressed by the Raven costume! That poncho was a stroke of genius.
But where is Luke’s single black glove to cover his electronic hand????? If your son is interested in more complicated Star Wars Costumes, he should check out the Padawan’s Guide. It’s an AMAZING resource website for all things Star Wars.
There’s a whole world of costume-makers on the web doing everything from anime and comic books to movies and historically accurate costumes and I love ALL of IT!
Okay, change that from “hobbyist” to “extreme enthusiast.”