Happy Friday! As our annual tradition, we’re sharing what Clara and Burger are dressing up as this Halloween. I made Clara’s costume myself for the second year in a row (without tears or swearing), and I’m really pleased with how it turned out. At first Clara announced she wanted to be a lawyer, which made us laugh and imagine her with a tiny briefcase. A few days later she changed her mind: “I want to be a jellyfish!” When we asked what color, she declared, “I want to be a pink jellyfish… and I don’t want to be a regular jellyfish, I want to be A FAIRY QUEEN OF THE JELLYFISH!” So that’s what we built.
I transformed a clear umbrella into a glowing jellyfish using pink tissue paper, fabric ribbon, and curling plastic ribbon. John added battery-powered “cold-to-the-touch” LEDs so it lights up (tech-savvy husband to the rescue). Clara was ecstatic the first time she saw it (she even tried to hug her costume). Burger, predictably, was a lot less thrilled — more on him below.
To create the umbrella jellyfish, I researched other DIY ideas online. Many concepts used stuffed hats or decorated umbrellas, and the umbrella approach appealed because Clara can hold and swing it instead of balancing it on her head. We bought a clear umbrella from Target and started there.
The first step was tucking pink tissue paper into each umbrella panel so the top wouldn’t be fully see-through. I wanted Clara to be able to see beneath the umbrella, so I left the bottom clearer and made the top more opaque for a jellyfish look. Next I tied long strands of thick fabric ribbon around the umbrella’s inner spines so they could hang down like tentacles. I considered lots of ideas — bubble wrap, fabric strips, ribbon — but used materials we already had on hand.
Finally, I added many lengths of pink curling plastic ribbon — the only item I bought, a budget find at Michaels — tying six lengths to each of the umbrella’s eight spines. After knotting each bundle, I ran a scissors edge down the ribbon to curl it and create bouncy tentacles.
When Clara returned from school and saw the finished costume, she was speechless in the best way — lots of “wows” and a delighted “it’s AMAZING!” Then John added the battery LEDs (a string of fairy lights), and the glow made it even more magical. Since it gets dark earlier now, the lights should also help with visibility. Here it is glowing in the darkest corner of our house — our closet.
We don’t expect Clara to hold the umbrella the entire time she’s trick-or-treating, so she’ll wear a tulle skirt and other fairy-queen accessories underneath. If she tires of the umbrella, she’ll still be a fairy queen with a wand and crown on hand for extra sparkle.
Burger, however, has never been fond of wearing anything. Sweaters, boots, hats — he dislikes them all. This year he became a seal in a costume we found at Target. We’ve made a tradition of dressing him up with Clara every Halloween, so we couldn’t resist. We joked he needed a crown and scepter to be the King Seal to match Clara’s royal jellyfish. He didn’t look thrilled, but he’s undeniably cute.
Maybe Burger secretly loves costumes, because he seems to take great pleasure in shimmying and wriggling to escape them. It’s a performance in itself.
This year John and I are going to a costume party, so after some brainstorming we leaned into a Game of Thrones theme. People sometimes say I resemble Daenerys Targaryen, so I grabbed a cheap blonde wig from Target and paired it with a green dress I already owned. I used a ten-cent placemat from a yard sale to fashion a gold belt and small shoulder accents for extra flair.
I cut the placemat to create a front plate and small shoulder pieces, then secured them with the dress’s rope belt and a few pins. The whole costume cost about $9 for the wig and $0.10 for the placemat. Easy and effective.
John’s costume is my favorite — it really suits him. I suggested he be Khal Drogo, and then Littlefinger, but he surprised me with a punny idea: “John Snow.” He wore a wool hat and added a big paper snowflake to a shirt to become John Snow. The snowflake was made from white duct tape on a blue T-shirt so he can peel it off later and still wear the shirt normally.
Watching him place each strip of tape while wearing the shirt was hilarious — very committed. My version of a snowflake would likely be simpler, but his was delightfully over-the-top.
Our costumes are low-key and not super intricate, but they’re fun and should be perfect for the party. Now we just need to decide what dish to bring.
Also, if you watch Game of Thrones, there’s a ridiculously inappropriate dubbed clip we keep quoting, which has us saying silly lines like “Are you a fan of the Pikachu?” and “I’m working on a gravity belt.”
And the buggy pumpkins! I adore unusually shaped pumpkins, and Clara loves bugs, so we turned two bug-like pumpkins into a spider and a caterpillar. They started out oddly shaped, which inspired the idea.
We enjoyed a fun painting session: Clara painted the spider top and we left the underside orange to mimic legs. I added a painted eye and quick brush strokes to suggest the caterpillar’s segments. When they dried, we painted eyes and called them done.
We’ll pick more pumpkins to carve after Clara’s pumpkin patch trip next week, and you can bet there will be freshly baked pumpkin seeds at our house. What are your plans for pumpkins and costumes this year?
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If you’d like to walk down memory lane and see past costumes, here are a few favorites: Jesse & Slinky Dog, monkey & banana, and their first Halloween as a hot dog & hamburger.
