kcwc: halloween costume inspiration and tutorials

September 17th, 2010

My mother didn’t care for halloween, to put it mildly, and really I don’t blame her: whining for expensive costumes that last for one night, demanding different ones at the last minute, coming home with a pillowcase full of candy and then belly aches and sugar melt downs for days.  I can feel the hate for halloween in my genes, but I try to fight it. As long as I treat halloween costumes as quick and dirty projects then I’m not mad when they are rejected or ripped or ugly or whatever.  A lot of people love halloween though and thank goodness because they make awesome costumes for us to ogle.

amazing and creative handmade halloween costumes


1. Baby Woodpecker, 2. Devil(ed) Egg, 3. Jedi Robe, 4. lace crown, 5. Star wars birthday courtesy of oliver and s and ottobre, 6. angry/suprised owl, 7. Infant Elvis Costume, 8. week 9.2, 9. in lieu

This is just a small selection of the fantastic tutorials out there for kids’ halloween costumes. The creativity and the construction of these costumes blows me away. If you know of any good tutorials (or have made some yourself) please leave a comment linking to it.  And get ready because the challenge starts on Monday!

hilarious halloween costume tutorials

1. strong man 2. freezer paper skeleton costume 3. sock monkey 4. pukka costume 5. care bear costume 6. frankenstein 7. happy mutant three armed baby 8. last minute kids owl costume 9. daisy costume

13 Responses to kcwc: halloween costume inspiration and tutorials

  1. Beth D. says:

    Wow! All great inspiration. I think I’m gonna have to try to change my son’s mind from Batman to something a bit more fun for me!

  2. Ooh – bookmarking the owls for future Halloweens.

    Just posted a Lady Bug tutorial for this year:

    http://mamahootdesigns.blogspot.com/2010/09/lady-bug-costumebackpack-tutorial.html

  3. Holly says:

    Oh my. I may have to make a Halloween costume now. Just because I hate the cheap crap at the stores and have for years–and it is expensive for cheap crap. And my boy has requested to be a monster, so with that kind of broad license, I am sure I could sew something that I will not screw up too badly.

  4. Kimberly says:

    Oh man that fuzzy owl costume is rad and I’m a sucker for Star Wars.

  5. Jennifer says:

    I’m in love with those owl costumes!

    My mom wasn’t really big on Halloween. I usually just borrowed old costumes from my friends.

    So I’m not typically all that crafty when it comes to halloween costumes. But 2 years ago when I found a women’s striped shirt at a local “free clothing closet” it just screamed “jailbird” to me and I used it to make a costume for my 8-month old.

    See the costume here:

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/21622835@N05/3644373516/

  6. Becky says:

    Check out our chicken and egg from last year! They were the hit of the neighborhood:)

    http://belle-n-bee.blogspot.com/2010/09/r-u-chicken.html

  7. Raven says:

    Meg – I mess around with the html from your kcwc buttons on my blogger page. I kept getting italicized quotation marks and had to change them to regular before the button would work. Does that make sense? I worked some how. I can’t wait! :)

  8. craftytammie says:

    oh my gosh. i love those baby costumes! strong man, mutant baby – too funny and awesome.

  9. Becky says:

    Raven – Can you send me the html that you finally got to work? I’ve played around with the quotation marks and can’t seem to get them to work.
    beckymac1@hotmail.com

  10. Jenny says:

    I made a supergirl costume out of clothing I had around the house last Halloween. Here’s the link and how I did it: http://mountainmama-jenny.blogspot.com/2009/10/its-bird-its-plane.html

    It’s been used many times for imaginary play since Halloween and my 4 year old is expecting to wear it this year.

  11. Sarah says:

    Personally, i find the key is to have the costume done BEFORE Halloween, preferably a few weeks. They are so pscyhed leading up to the day that they wear them a ton, so by the time the actual night comes, it doesn’t really matter if they wear them out or switch at the last minute to something lame. Also you can get great daylight photos. It’s all good.

  12. oh, these are great–especially all the starwars–never out of fashion, right?. Here’s a photo of the ewok costume I made for my son last year:

    http://www.flickr.com/photos/98076237@N00/4074021528/in/set-72157622605465801/

    and I will be spending time this week on a Captain Hook costume for my older son, god help me.