Here are some of my favorite Family Halloween Costume Ideas that we’ve done over the years!
So… I LOVE Halloween! I’ve told you this in my other fall posts (Spooky Movie Night, & DIY Doormat,) but seriously- Fall is my HAPPY PLACE!!
One of my favorite types of nights EVER is a chilly, spooky night bundled up with comfy clothes and a Halloween movie! Just the BEST!
It also helps that I have my degree in Musical Theater and love to be in costume and makeup!
As y’all know by now, I love DIY! My brain is just wired to think about how things are made and try and recreate them!
Sewing and crafting were some of my first loves besides singing. I know it all stemmed from my sweet Nana who just passed away several weeks ago.
She had a love for projects like myself and taught me SO much. Every time I was with her I couldn’t believe how similar we are.
She never sits still. Always has to have a project on her lap and is always thinking of what she can make herself!
Nana knew how to needle point, crochet, knit, sew, embroider, reupholster, build, craft – just about anything with DIY and crafts. She was an AMAZING woman!
(Check out this post I wrote about her!)
She taught me how to sew, knit, crochet, needle point, etc.
Since my brian is wired for projects, I also learned (self taught) to reupholster and make other fun crafts.
This has come in handy over the years!
DIY GROWING UP
Since I was in theater, I grew up having to help make sets, props, costumes, costume accessories etc.
Funny story – I played Maria Von Trapp in The Sound of Music when I was in college.
We had to make ALL the nun robes and habits ourselves!! I rolled out 90 yards of fabric and cut out the pieces for almost all of them!
I also sewed about 15 of them together!
Doing shows that need us to participate with all the projects taught me so much more along the way. I learned a ton sewing alongside other true seamstresses.
And to tell you the truth – I loved every minute of it!
Now that I have kiddos (and also direct so much theater) these skills have come in handy over and over!
Like I said in my Toy Story Birthday Party post, I worked for a birthday party company while in college.
After I graduated with my degree, I started my own Princess Party Company and made 7 or 8 full, adult princess gowns for myself and my employees to wear to parties!
Now that I have kiddos (and also direct so much theater) these skills have come in handy over and over!
All of these Halloween costume ideas I put together or made myself!
So here’s some of our favs from over the past several years!
This costume is one of my better Halloween costume ideas but was a bit of a project! But it was SUPER fun to make!
For the engineer part of the costume I just put Jaden in classic Osh Kosh. To give his outfit some finishing touches, I tied a bandana around his neck and gave him a hat!
Honest moment – I knew we had an engineer’s hat but couldn’t find it in time. (I should have started looking for it sooner!)
SO! I just grabbed a hat that worked color wise, and attached a Sodor Train Station logo to the front.
THEN came the fun part… making Thomas himself!
I knew I wanted Jaden to wear Thomas around himself so it looked like he was driving the train. So, I got a large box and cut off all the flaps. Then only the 4 sides were left.
This way he could stand in it. The box was basically just a frame now.
Next, I spray painted it light blue to match Thomas’s color.
For Thomas’s face, I found a round box and spray painted it black. I cut a grey piece of cardstock into a circle and drew on Thomas’s face. (I added some white pieces of cardstock for his eyes and mouth to pop!)
For the wheels, I spray painted paper plates black and cut them in half.
PRO TIP:
When making shapes, it’s best to find something to trace that’s a similar size and shape.
Then you can erase and reshape it all you want but you’re not trying to “free hand” two matching circles. (That’s next to impossible for me!)
For his funnel, I took a paper towel roll and spray painted it black as well. To give the funnel a bit of “life”, I stuck some cotton in it to look like steam!
I used some red masking tape, yellow cardstock to give Thomas some trim as well as his number 1! Then I attached some straps in an “X” across the box so Jaden could wear him as a backpack!
It was great! The best was watching him trot around without holding onto it and loving the fact it would stay with him!! TOO cute!
Needless to say, this halloween costume idea is both adorable and hilarious!
I’m not sure if this is a good thing or not… but the only item we purchased for this costume were the balloons!
Jaden already had the pants, shoes, bow tie and sweater! We threw on Matt’s glasses and handed him some balloons and we had ourselves a CARL!
This costume is fairly easy. As long as you have a sweater, bow tie, glasses and balloons, you can’t go wrong!
I’ve seen some people even make a PVC pipe walker with the tennis balls on the bottom and everything! We obviously didn’t go that far but I still think it’s hilarious!
So Peter Pan is a family favorite of ours! It was a movie we watched as kids and have grown up to love it even more.
Now Jaden has grown to love Peter Pan as well!
This was one of my FAVORITE halloween costume ideas!
It came about when Jaden was 2 because I thought it would be fun to be Tinker Bell. We made Matt be Peter and Jaden a lost boy!
For my costume, I grabbed a green tank top and shorts from Goodwill and found some fairy wings and a green tutu. I already had shoes with pearls on the toes so I swooped my hair up and called it a day!
Matt got to wear the green tights and all! While I was at Goodwill, I found him a hat, an oversized green polo.
We threw a belt around him and Peter Pan had arrived!
And Jaden was the easiest! We ordered a racoon hoodie from Amazon and put him in some sweatpants! He looked JUST like a lost boy from the movie!
PETER PAN AND THE GANG
A few years later, Jaden wanted to have a Peter Pan birthday party. (I plan to write about that soon! Be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss anything!!) So for us, this wasn’t technically one of our halloween costume ideas.
He, of course, wanted to be Peter Pan. And since we had Parker James at this point, it only made sense that Matt, the baby and I were Wendy, John and Michael!
We basically just used real clothes and hats to pull off these costumes!
CAPTAIN HOOK & MR. SMEE
Now that Parker James is in the picture, it’s been SO fun to pair the boys together for costumes!
This halloween costume idea is pretty simple as well! I just grabbed one of Parker James’ striped onesie then made him a hat out of a red shirt.
Jaden’s hook, hat and sword were all part of a costume pack we already had in our toy box at home. The only thing I needed for his outfit was some sort of red outerwear to look like Captain Hook’s coat.
I ended up grabbing a red button up shirt at Goodwill and cinching in the sides to make it look a bit tailored.
Moment of honesty – I wish I would have bought a bigger red shirt so it was longer on him and had more fabric around his legs. Hindsight… am I right?!
If I had the time, I would have embellished his costume a bit more – given him a black vest and a ruffly collar. But this was one of my more “laid back” and last minute costumes. (Notice the Nike pants….)
Before I thought of the red shirt idea for the coat, I was just going to tie a red sash around his waist as a “pirate sash”. So that’s an option too!
Throw a little face paint (or eye liner in Jaden’s case LOL!) on as a mustache and you have yourself a captain Hook!
SUCH a fun halloween costume idea!
I love sweet classic looks. We style the boys in very classic outfits.
When it came to being Christopher Robin, I didn’t actually have to purchase anything!
We already owned royal blue shorts and a yellow shirt. After he put on his white socks and boat shoes, I just handed him a red balloon and Pooh Bear and he was set!
We thought about this year having Jaden be Christopher Robin and the baby being Pooh or Jaden as Pooh and the baby as Piglet.
But a pirate and a firefighter seemed much more up Jaden’s alley!
If you read the Toy Story Birthday Party post, you’ve already seen Jaden as Woody and know how much he loves Toy Story!
Before we threw him a Toy Story Party, he wanted to be Buzz for halloween.
This was QUITE a DIY costume. Yes… I could have just purchased a Buzz Lightyear shirt or even the jammies (which we actually had… hence his green PJ Buzz pants…)
But… I didn’t… I knew I was going to make him some wings so I wanted to have everything look cohesive.
I ended up taking a long sleeve white shirt and hot gluing felt pieces in the shape of buttons and trim on Buzz’s astronaut suit.
For the wings, I basically did the same thing. For the base of it, I used white foam board from Dollar Tree. (Remember my love for their craft supplies!?!)
Buzz has a little purple hood. I made Jaden one out of felt as well.
Because I’m not a perfectionist (believe it not!), I didn’t want to make him a full hood or purchase a purple hoodie to put underneath (another option if you don’t want to make the hood!).
So I just made the hood with a little collar that we tucked down in his shirt. He LOVED being Buzz!
THE REST OF THE CREW
For the rest of our costumes, I tried my best to find clothing that could work “as is” or almost to save me some time.
Matt was Woody and I was able to find him a yellow plaid button up at Goodwill as well as a cowboy hat.
I made his cowhide vest out of an old white T-shirt and black felt! I just hemmed the edges in the shape of the vest and hot glued the black felt patches on!
Jaden wanted me to be Jessie rather than Bow Peep. I thought this would be easier…
Let me start by telling you… I spent the MOST time on my costume! The concept wasn’t that hard. It’s just how LONG it took to finish it.
First of all, I made my own yarn wig… yep… like sewed it together. It wasn’t too incredibly hard but did take some time. (I used THIS video for tips on how to make it.)
For my shirt, I took an old white button up I had and used yellow felt as the trim. Here’s where things got messy…
I thought it would be SO much easier to just hot glue the yellow pieces on the shirt and the cuffs rather than sewing it on…
But I didn’t think about how hard it would be to sew THROUGH hot glue when attaching the red yarn lasso trim… it took me DAYS off and on to push through all that glue.
My thumb was RAW from pushing the needle so hard! Sooo… note to self… Tack it on with a needle and thread next time!
For Jessie’s hat I just looped some white yarn around the edges and hot glued a ribbon to the top of it!
Matt’s best bud joined us so I quickly threw together a “Rex” hat for him with some green and white felt.
Needless to say we had a blast! Such a great halloween costume idea!
Like so many boys his age, Jaden is a runner! I mean like a true runner. He runs everywhere he goes. In the house. Outside. On a walk. Everywhere.
When we go to parks and playgrounds, he’ll run the tracks there a few times just for fun…
To get his energy out when we go for walks, I tell him to run up to a certain tree or stop sign and back to me. He ends up running triple the distance I actually walk!
Because of this, when he started watching “The Incredibles” we started calling Dash! After baths, we started combing his hair back like Dash just for fun.
When it came time to kick around halloween costume ideas, Dash was of COURSE the first one we named!
And because we had just had Parker James, we HAD to make him Jack Jack!
Their costumes weren’t too hard to make honestly. I used red pajamas (and some black ladies underwear! Sewing the baby’s pair to fit was pretty funny!)
We ended up just ordering a few black eye masks. Except for Parker James – I made his from felt.
Jaden used my black long silk gloves (rolled up) for his super hero gloves and I made him some boot shoe covers out of felt.
I made us all several “Incredibles” logos to stick on Matt and I’s shirts as well as a large white “Syndrome” S for Matt’s BFF “Uncle John”.
We were only missing someone to go with us as Violet! I’d say we did pretty well!
Lastly, this year Jaden wanted to be a fireman! We already had the Melissa & Doug fireman suit. So all I had to do was make the baby’s dalmatian outfit!
And it was super simple too! I painted black dots with a round sponge paint brush (the same one I used in my DIY Doormat post!) on a white onesie, pants and hat.
I found these tiny fireman hats! (SO CUTE!!) And hot glued one onto the white hat alone with some felt ears.
Last, I glued on a little felt tail and sewed on a red collar (I just removed one from an old red T- shirt) as well as added a little yellow felt doggie tag. And of course it had to have a PJ on it for Parker James!
The sweetest Fire boys around!
– – – –
Have you tried any of these projects or Halloween costume ideas? I’d love to hear what you thought or your OWN ideas! Shoot me an email! Be sure to subscribe below so you never miss a post! Follow me on Instagram and Pinterest!