Baby Halloween Costume Tips for Lazy/Crafty Moms

This is the first costume I ever made for Austin. And here it is, on MSN Canada! He's famous! Now I feel qualified to blog about costume tips! And fear not, these costumes were pretty darn cheap and don't require much in the way of skill. I don't even have a sewing machine. Here's how I made the costumes for Austin's first two Halloweens out of 2 yards of the same cheap, fake fur.

So, first costume is for newborns to 3 months, depending on how active your child is. Austin is 1 month and 1 week old in these pictures. Obviously there are some things that make this age unique, for one, he didn't move much more than the average stuffed animal. This meant I didn't have to worry about the costume getting yanked off or having feet sturdy enough for walking. These are made from cardboard I cut out and colored with Sharpie:

I folded the fabric over and sewed it to the cardboard with a heavy gauge needle to give it some dimension and a more finished look. The fabric actually wraps around the edge of the feet slightly and leaves the claws exposed. Here are his completed Yeti claws:

You will also need a way to get at the diaper easily and since little bitty babies aren't very coordinated or strong, you don't have to worry about making it hard for him to wiggle out of. The legs are basically leg warmers with attached feet so you don't have to remove any part of the costume to change him. You can actually see this in the video of us dressing him here. There was a hole on the inside ankle of each leg that allowed me to reach up and pull his feet through. Here's how we did it...

Select an outfit you or your child hate or have stained beyond repair. Build the costume over it. This saves a ton of time trying to measure a wriggling kid. It also saves you from having to line the costume, in case, like me, you bought some fake fur at the fabric store that seems like it would be intolerably itchy.








Use paper grocery bags to cut patterns. The paper is nice and sturdy and holds up well for pinning.

It also makes good ears. I cut these out of brown paper bags and stitched the fabric to them, and then stitched them on the headpiece. The headpiece was just two half rounds sewn together on top, then lined with a piece of an old pair of pantyhose.




His second Halloween he was a little bit bigger (obviously) and much more opinionated.

Owls are a hoot, they said

 This costume is pretty similar to the first one I made. I used an old onesie again for the base, stitching the owl pattern together and then stitching its shoulders to the shoulders of the onesie that went inside. He wore babylegs on his calves.

The dreaded, man-eating land owl