Many market analysts currently suggest we are either emerging or are close to emerging from our recession. All agree however, that hard times will still linger for many months and perhaps years. With the holiday season approaching, we could all use some cost-saving measures. This month we shall discuss ways to make your family’s Halloween more enjoyable by trimming out the unnecessary expense.
Halloween Costumes
Instead of running to the nearest discount store to purchase a commercial costume, why not begin your Halloween preparations by shopping at home. There is no end of possibilities if you are creative.
Let’s begin in your closet. Look inside, what do you see? Have you an old prom dress, bridesmaid dress, colorful skirts or trousers that you no longer wear? Do your drawers contain old stockings, even nylon hose, or perhaps perfectly good but mismatched socks that haven’t a mate? Do you or your children have solid-colored sweats, PJs, or perhaps an old uniform, be it a medical, military, or fast-food variety? Do your cupboards sport skeins of yarn, scraps of material, or squares of felt? Have you got an old bicycle helmet you were thinking of donating to charity? Does your garage have an unused cardboard box or two? Is there unused poster board somewhere around your house?
Are there wigs, crowns, headbands, and unused make-up from Halloween’s past? Are there old sheets among your linens? If you can say yes to any of these questions, then you have the makings of a Halloween costume.
Out-sized Clothing
Without additional sewing, your big-sized clothing can be adapted into a Halloween costume for your child. Your trousers, a flannel shirt, perhaps a pair of suspenders, and a few pillows can turn your child into a scarecrow, a hobo, an old man or old lady, a scary spook, or a clown. With a little cutting, here and there, your old skirts can be cut the hem of a skirt or trousers into zig-zags large or small.
An additional skirt can become the cape or a vest. An old belt can secure the costume at the waist. You have the makings of a great pirate, a gypsy, a vampire, or a witch. Your old uniforms can become wonderful costumes. You can become a crazed Fast Food Worker, a GI Joe, a doctor, a nurse, a mad scientist, or a distressed patient all by the creative use of a uniform. A bicycle helmet can be the beginning of a knight’s helmet or the helmet of an athlete or whatever you want it to be.
Remodeled Clothing
If you are handy with a sewing machine, you can re-fashion your old clothing into so many possibilities. Left-over fabric and old clothing which is picked apart can be turned into just about anything. My old prom dress once turned my five year old into Princess Diana. An old sheet became an angel costume. A friends circle skirt and a cut-down sweater became a cheerleader costume. Cut-down sweats and an old sweatshirt became the makings of a football uniform. For additional possibilities, explore the internet for Halloween costume ideas or check color books or even browse through the racks of the commercial costumes for ideas which you can adapt from old clothing.
Sweats, Leotards and Tights, and Pajamas.
Utilize your children’s sweats, pajamas and dance leotards as the basics for a great costume. If the sweats are a neutral color, black, brown, or navy, all the better. Pajamas, particularly pajamas with feet, can become great animal costumes. Black sweats with a strip from a white sheet sewn down the back or painted onto it can become a skunk. A pom-pom tail and a headband with homemade ears attached becomes a bunny. Green sweats and a painted cardboard box or a posterboard have the making of a great turtle costume. Yellow, brown, or black sweats or pajamas with spots sewn or pinned upon it can become a puppy or kitten.
Stuffed and worn black hose or tights can be turned into legs and attached together with black ribbon to become spider legs and worn with a leotard or black sweats. This same basic black can also be turned into a lady bug but don’t forget the red and black painted box or posterboard. White sweats, white tennis shoes, black pom-poms, a felt-made carrot nose, and Christmas stockings can become a snowman. The same basic white jog suit can be with a few, well placed black felt spots be turned into a cow costume. Take the insides out of a broken black umbrella and you have the makings for great bat wings. A dozen purple or green balloons pinned on sweats or leotard can become a bunch of grapes or the equivalent in assorted colors can make a child a package of jelly beans. Sweats, leotards, tights and cardboard box can become a rubics cube, a dice, or with the addition of hot-glued and painted cottage cheese cartons, a lego.
Take an old laundry basket and cut a hole in the bottom so that it fits snugly at your child’s hips. Fill the basket with a few pieces of clothing and pin a dryer sheet or two onto their sweats. They have become a laundry basket. Or forget the basket and pin clothing and dryer sheets onto them, tease their hair and spray it so that it stand straight up and paint their face white—they have become static cling. For any or all of these costumes ideas the addition of headbands and beanie hats with ears, antenna, or whatever, complete the costume. Sometimes big, chunky jewelry is needed to complete the look. Old stockings and mittens can not only keep your child’s head warm, but can be used over hands and feet to also complete the look.
Costume Exchanges
Exchange with your friends or family members. What someone else wore last year or two years ago is still suitable to be worn again this year and perhaps for years to come. Or go to a charity shop to purchase clothing suitable to meet your child’s desired costumed look.
Makeup
We have discovered with our own children that any costume is greatly enhanced by makeup. Makeup is cheap and application ideas can be discovered in library books or on the internet. Anything can be done by skillful application of make-up. From the face of a clown to the face of a dog or even a lion, your child can look amazing in whatever he is wearing.
Treat
Neighborhood trick or treating necessitates that you buy candy from a store, but homemade treats for your family create warm and lasting traditions. Old fashioned Halloween treats included homemade caramels, caramel apples, and popcorn balls. Our own family has their own Halloween tradition. It includes chili, hot cider, and homemade doughnuts. Here are our recipes:
Halloween Chili
1 lb. hamburger
1 or 2 small cans kidney beans (or soak your own and add a little bacon )
2 small green peppers
2 medium onions
1 small stalk celery
1 can tomato soup, diluted with 1 can water
1 No. 2 can tomatoes
Brown meat; add onion, green peppers, and celery which has been chopped. Season with garlic salt, celery salt, and salt and pepper to taste. Add tomatoes, tomato soup, and water. Add beans or just add to beans if you’ve soaked your own. Simmer 1 ½ hours. This freezes well.
Hot Cider
1 large bottle of apple juice or cider
1 can frozen lemonade
2 sticks of cinnamon
Heat and serve.
Doughnuts
6 cups flour
½ c. shortening, mix like pie dough
4 Tbsp. sugar
1 tsp. salt
1 egg
2 cups milk
2 Tbsp. yeast
1/3 c. mashed potatoes
Warm the 2 cups milk, dissolve yeast and let rise for 15 minutes. Add all wet ingredients, then add all the dry ingredients and mix. Knead 10 minutes. Roll ½-inch thick. Cut and let raise ½ hour or until light. Deep fry in vegetable oil at 375-degrees. Glaze: ½ c. boiling water, 1 pkg. powdered sugar, ½ tsp. vanilla. Makes 48 doughnuts.
Have a terrific and less frightful Halloween this season.
