What costumes did you have as a kid? Adult?
My mom once dressed up my elder sister and I as Raggedy Ann and Andy when we were 6 and 7. I was so embarrassed (I was easily embarrassed about anything as a kid.) Didn’t think much about wearing red lipstick, rouge and a yarn wig. It was easily the most memorable costume I had as a kid. After that “debacle” I demanded and wore the 70s style sharp edged plastic face mask with elastic and flimsy PJ style costumes just like all my peers did to my mom’s dismay. I really didn’t want to stand out as a kid (I had some weird ideas when I was young.)
My mom took out her creative costume making juices on the family Doxie who became a hot dog or potato.
As an adult, I am not exactly filled with whimsy. I ended up dressing once as a potato (idea stolen from the dog’s outfit) for a costume party in university. During the OJ trial days, I dressed up as Judge Lance Ito (originally, it was supposed to be a witch costume, but it quickly became a judges robe which worked as I had a peach fuzz beard.) The kids didn’t get it, but the adults got a laugh.
I don’t dress up in costume anymore unless it is as a grumpy middle aged male who gives out candy when he’s not working Halloween.
So who among us still get into Halloween? Or leave it for the kids?
I love dressing up for Halloween (as a kid and adult)! The costume I was most proud of making as a tween was a toilet. I wore one large box on my body as the water tank and held another box out in front as the bowl. Inside the bowl I stuck plastic wrap to imitate water decorated with “used” toilet paper etc. It also doubled as my treat bag. It had a lid that was attached to the tank by fishing line. When I extended the bowl for treats, the lid would open. Yes I was a nerd.
As an adult, I’m still very proud of the Ruby Rhod + Jean-Baptiste Emanuel Zorg and Tron couple costumes that I made. Yes I am still a nerd and have been making couple costumes ever since I started dating my husband.
Initially I endeavoured to make family costumes. Avatar the Last Airbender was a big hit when we had our first kid (Ang, Katara and Appa). But now the kids get to choose and I end up buying generic costumes based on their fickle whims. This year we are a family of Vampire Fairies (inspired by the Isadora Moon series).
Our costumes when I was a kid were whatever we could cobble together from old clothes of my parents/aunts/uncles. When my daughter was a child I sewed her elaborate costumes including a Sailor Moon that I had to piece together from three different patterns, and a dark fairy that had 4’ wings.
I remember those cheap costumes with the flimsy masks and I tried really hard to avoid them, usually cobbling together some kind of pirate or vampire type thing.
I never understood why so many of those costumes had the thing they were supposed to be printed on the plastic costume itself, like the Bozo or bear costumes here.
https://www.antiquetrader.com/pop-culture/vintage-halloween-costumes-scare-up-thrills-n-chills
One year I went as cousin It from the Addams Family by wearing an old shawl of my grandmothers tossed over my head – most people had to ask me what I was. I was also overshadowed by my younger sister who decided at the last minute that she wanted to be a lizard. My mother, who was an elementary school art teacher at the time, took some construction paper and a stapler and made her this amazing dinosaur costume which she called The Prehistoric Lizard. It was really flimsy and s by our fifth house but everyone thought it was fantastic.
*started tearing apart*
I was having a hard time editing.
Same, flimsy dime store costumes, until I was old enough to go in my own choice of found objects, usually as a witch and crystal ball or tarot card reader. The last adult dress-up event I attended was about 10 years ago. I went as witch with a third eye in my forehead, obtained from an online taxidermy shop. My son was of the time when teenage mutant ninja turtles or power rangers were the cool costumes.