Every year, we head down to Toronto's Fan Expo Canada in early August to browse comics, up-and-coming movies, and all the rest. One of my favourite parts of the convention is just walking around and seeing all the amaizng do-it-yourself costumes that people worked on just for this early-Halloween fun. This got me thinking of doing a little DIY myself, so I thought I'd share some of my favourite costumes from this year's convention from the easy to the insane to get you last-minute mamas like me inspired.
Lady Medieval Spawn
So, this may not be a simple DIY (fifty hours worth of work!) but this costume is fantastic, and I wanted to show you what a little effort can do. The cape is made from vinyl and coat hangers and the boot covers are cardboard!
Terezai & Karcat from Homestuck and Big and Little Sister from Bioshock
From left to right these are two pairs of characters from very different genres (on the left, web comic Homestuck, and on the right, video game Bioshock) but these pairs of sisters decided to cover more ground by sharing what they love with each other. The most intricate costume is the "Big Sister" one because of the weapon and the helmet (which took a few months of work) but the others took around one week each. Totally doable in the time remaining before Halloween.
Out-of-Work Stormtrooper
This one is super funny and easy. Stormtrooper helmets are pretty easy to come by, and the rest of the clothes just look like beat up duds that you probably have in the house already. Add cardboard sign, and voila!
Scarecrow and Poison Ivy from Batman
Speaking of easy, this pair said they put their costumes together in hours. The young man on the right said all he had to do was, "put on a suit and make a mask out of a scrap of fabric and some marker." While Poison Ivy bought some undergarments at a discount store and hot glued dollar store leaves to it. She said it took about two days.
Slash/Rock Star
I think that possibly everyone born between 1975-1985 was Slash for Halloween at one point. This young man put his costume together in about a day (he said he needed to find the right wig), but mostly wore his own clothes. The guitar, however, was hand carved by him and took him about four months. If you've got Rock Band or Guitar Hero at home, you can easily work around this one.
Cardboard Box Iron Man
I love, love, love, love, love this one! Hard to maneuver in, but totally makable in a short time. The youngster inside this creative costume said it took a month only because he was "lazy" and that it could have probably been made in a week or two with some hard work.
Lord of The Rings Hobbit and Nazgul
These two guys couldn't have been older than about twelve, and they both made their own costumes! Matthew on the right said it took him about a week to make his Hobbit costume, mostly from clothes he had at home (and he made his sword) and his friend's Nazgul costume took one day (it was a last minute costume choice). These, and many of the other kids costumes I saw at Fan Expo were my favourite.
My little guy has asked if he can be "Ghost Batman." I have been thinking about this—as it's going to clearly take some DIY—but I'm not entirely sure how I'm going to make this happen. Maybe I should continue to look over some other amazing cosplays around the net.
What are your little ghouls going as for Halloween?
Check out more scary secrets for making this Halloween terrific-ly terrifying.
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