Frugal Fun: Halloween Costume Ideas

Oh, hi.

I had a baby, transitioned to stay-at-home-mom (for a year....?), and have been working on adjusting to life with a toddler and an infant.

So, here we are back in the saddle of writing a blog.  I was inspired by my friend Sara (Feeding the Soil) in two ways for this post: 1) she has also gone through all of the above and more - she's opening Austin's first public Montessori school next fall, NBD... and 2) she just posted about Halloween costume ideas for her toddler and baby.  She is super-creative and crafty and makes her costumes from scratch each year. Ugh, talk about an admiration/jealousy combination.  So far I've managed to come up with original costumes for Zoe that did not require any affinity for crafting, or really more than an hour or two of thought for that matter.  I'm hoping to keep this up as long as possible, but this year is going to be a bit more of a challenge than previous years:

The first year, I dressed her up as Rosie the Riveter (TOUGH GIRL POWER!  My daughter is going to be an engineer/architect/tomboy, dangit, none of this princess girly-girl pink business.) This costume involved buying her a boy's plaid shirt, and borrowing a strip of red cloth. Sweet.

The second year, I dressed her up as a cat which is one of her favorite things, despite the fact that her most frequent experience with a cat is my sister-in-law's cat Emma, who runs and hides every time Zoe comes to their house.  This costume involved wearing a conglomerate of items she already had, adding the cat accessories, then drawing on her face with eyeliner.

Well, this year Zoe's favorite thing is Rapunzel, Cinderella, dancing and twirling (um, oops...how did that happen?).  Now, I am totally OK with watching the movies and playing dress-up and singing the songs.  But there is something about buying a pre-done cheaply-made polyester costume from the Disney store that I just can't get on board with.  I mean, Rapunzel didn't wear a dress with a plastic brooch encrusted with her own face.  So...what to do.  I'm not really crafty (ahem...even though my next post is going to be about dyeing my wedding dress...) so I'm thinking maybe I can just find a twirly dress at Thread or Goodwill and then make a paper tiara or something.  It may not be obviously Rapunzel but Zoe can just tell the people when she trick-or-treats and it will be super adorable.

BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE!  Now I have another kid.  Shoot.  My visions of keeping Halloween prep to a minimum are being ever thwarted.

Maybe I can try to dress Max up like Rapunzel's chameleon sidekick, Pascal, or maybe her trusty Frying Pan.   Both of those would involve a single-color onesie and then using some construction paper or cardboard to complete the outfit.

Any other ideas?