Young House Love

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Homemade Jesse & Slinky Dog Costumes From Toy Story

Dude, I did it! I semi-DIYed my very first Halloween costumes, and I lived to tell the tale. It actually wasn’t too hard (do you believe that I didn’t sew a single thing?). Holla!

Halloween 1 Greeting

In case it’s not super obvious, Clara asked to go as Jessie (the cowgirl from Toy Story) and Burger gets to be Slinky Dog (also from Toy Story). Here were most of my supplies for Clara’s costume:

  • a “cowgirl hat” from a local pop-up Halloween store
  • red yarn and white duct tape from AC Moore
  • flared jeans from Old Navy (you know I used a coupon and bought them on discount Tuesdays)

Halloween 2 Materials

The first thing I tackled was making a long Jessie-ish braid from the yarn and used the white duct tape to connect it to the hat. Looks pretty bad from the inside, but thankfully it’s all covered up when Clara puts it on, and it doesn’t seem to bother her (she loves her Jessie hair, and it actually seems to help make the slightly-too-big hat fit her a bit better – even though it still slides around a little).

Halloween 3 Braid Taped

Oh and she needed winter shoes/boots, so I found these cowgirl-ish boots at Old Navy on sale, so they’ll not only serve as shoes for the costume but she’ll hopefully get lots of wear out of them this winter. I also picked up an on-sale white button down (in the boy’s section) that she can wear well beyond this costume. And speaking of wearing-beyond-the-costume, see the jeans? I cow-patterned them up with white duct tape that I cut into different cow-spot-ish shapes. So it’s 100% removable so the jeans, the shirt, and the boots can just be worn normally after Halloween until Clara outgrows them.

Halloween 4 Costume Done

As for slinky dog’s costume, I just got a quarter yard of brown felt from JoAnn (on sale for 50 cents), cut it into a small strip that wraps around Burger’s tummy, and used velcro at each side of the strip to secure it under his ribcage. Then for the “slinky” we just got two yards of silver trim (from the aisle with all the fringe and beaded trim that you buy by the yard at JoAnn). I didn’t even sew the slinky trim onto the felt since I secured it with safety pins on the outside of the costume under his belly (so they’re not against Burger’s skin, they’re on the outside of the felt sleeve). I intended to stitch it after pinning it just to see how it looked, but it seems to work as-is. Burger doesn’t exactly love Halloween costumes – he wiggles out of them in about 5.5 seconds – so I figured it wasn’t worth breaking out a needle.

Halloween 5 Burger Up Close

Oh man, and my favorite detail is the gold fringe that I added to the bottom of Clara’s flared jeans. She LOVES it (“look how they shake mommy!”) and I’m so excited that it was only $1 worth of trim from JoAnn which I safety pinned in place (so once again, it can be removed and Clara can wear these jeans for the rest of the year). Although she loves them so much, we might de-cow-spot them and leave the fringe on for a little while… just because she gets such a kick out of it.

Halloween 6 Clara Fringe Feet

Here’s Clara’s Jessie hair from the back. Isn’t that long braid adorable? Oh man, I think my brain will explode when she actually has hair I can braid. Squuuueeeee!

Halloween 7 Clara Back

Oh and the belt! I made that with another trim thing I found at JoAnn (it was woven leather-looking trim that was the perfect width for her pants). I secured it with a round plastic pin/button (you know, the ones people wear on their lapel that say “vote for me for student council”) but it was a clear fillable plastic button, so I opened it and put yellow construction paper in it with a star in front of it that I cut from leftover brown slinky dog felt. Since it has a safety pin on the back of it, it holds the woven trim together like a belt, so for around $4 I made her that little cowgirl accessory.

Halloween 8 Clara Smiling

Weirdly enough, Clara’s favorite Jessie activity so far has been sliding her legs out on the floor like this in her boots (and occasionally hurting Woody, if he’s nearby). She’s got the moves like Jagger.

Halloween 9 Stepping On Woody

What sort of costumes are you guys DIYing this year? Anyone else using odd things like white duct tape when it comes to your costume? Or are you happy to buy something cute off the rack if it grabs you? I gotta admit we did that last year…

Costumes Sucking Thumb

… and the year before…

Halloween Costumes

… and it was tons of fun too. Hope you guys all have a safe and happy Halloween!!! And I’d love to hear (and see!) what your kiddos are going to be this year. And any grown ups in costume = awesomeville. Links, links, y’all!

Comments

  1. Rebecca S says

    Aww, she looks great! You did a great job on those, I’m seriously impressed. I can sew, but I avoid it whenever possible so I’ll be on the look out next year for no-sew costumes. I love that Burger’s costume coordinates with hers. Last year my oldest son was Mario, my daughter was Princess Peach and our Silky Terrier was a turtle shell. If you are familiar with Super Mario brothers, it was pretty perfect! Luckily our dog loves costumes (yes, he’s weird).

    Reply

  2. Theresa W says

    I LOVE Clara’s costume! My 9 yr old decided 24 hours before Trick-or-Treat that she wanted to be Jessie and I told her it was too late. I wish I’d seen this first! We probably could have thrown it together… Great job using what you have and making it adorable! Hope she had fun with the candy :)

    Reply

  5. Jenny @ We G Three says

    So cute!!!

    I DIYed our 6 month old’s Halloween costume, via Pinterest inspiration. She was an adorable baby ghost!

    http://wegthree.blogspot.com/2012/10/happy-halloween.html

    Like you guys, I made it with reusability in mind. I didn’t want to sacrifice a good white onesie forever, so I used large stitches (that will be easy to remove) to secure the ghost face. The tights she already owned, and I made her a fancy bow clippie for her headband, but resisted the urge to use Halloween ribbon/buttons and kept it all black & white so that she can wear it again.

    I forsee this being the first of many DIYed costumes to come! Once you start, it’s kind of hard to think of just buying something. =)

    Reply

  7. Patti says

    Oh my, Clara is the cutest in that costume! I felt so bad for the kids here in the northeast without a Halloween due to the storm damage. We were at the mall yesterday and the kids were trick or treating from shop to shop! So cute!

    Reply

  11. Megan B says

    I was pretty proud of the DIY job I did on my 2 year old’s bee costume. I basically made a pillowcase dress (from themotherhuddle.com’s tutorial) made from yellow fleece with black stripes that I sewed on (would use ribbon next time–seems like it’d be easier). The wings were made using a wire hanger and nylons, and the antennae were pipe cleaners glued to a headband. We got quite a few compliments, and the whole thing cost about $8.

    Reply

  12. Rae says

    I had home-made costumes for my kids this year. I shopped their closets and pulled out long sleeve yellow shirts, denim bibs, and had a co-worker crochet hats for them. They turned out as perfectly cute minions from despicable me. All it cost me was a skein of yellow yarn and they both have winter hats and the other clothes can all be re-worn until outgrown.

    http://sandstonecreekliving.blogspot.com/2012/10/trick-or-treat.html

    You can check out the pictures, Halloween doesn’t have to be expensive and my favorite costumes are always the homemade ones.

    Reply

  13. Christy Niebaum says

    My mom made a handmade sock monkey costume for my 9-month old daughter. She bought a beige sleeper outfit and used it as a base, sewing the sock monkey socks onto the sleeper. Then she used the leftover socks to make a hat. Red yarn finished off the outfit. It was pretty much the cutest thing in the entire world.

    Reply

  15. Sarah Berry says

    I did a semi-DIY costume for my three year old son this year. I had so much fun making a simple black sweat suit in to a tiger costume (i ound the idea online). Strips of tapered orange duct tape, some orange foam (for ears) and a sharpie was all it took. The interweb is awesome!

    Reply

  16. Isaura says

    I made my 10 month old into a mummy by using fabric glue to attach pieces of muslin to a whole body onesie and I was a zombie mom. I got this idea from Heidi Klum.

    Reply

  17. Morgan says

    I just have to come back to this post and say that this costume is AWESOME! The hair is the best, I have so many ideas for Liv’s costume next year now…

    Reply

  18. Kara says

    Love, love, love the personal homemade costume. Makes me feel all sentimental for my homemade costumes while growing up. Adorable, and obviously very much adored by Clara!

    Reply

  20. Mallory says

    My fiance and I dressed up as Bill Nye and Ms. Frizzle.

    http://t.co/wYjxeuVq

    He’s getting his PhD in Chemistry, so he had ready access to a lab coat. A little Amazon hunting for a lizard, a bow tie, and cute dress from Modcloth….pretty low-key but it was a hit amongst our nerdy friends!

    Reply

  22. Heather says

    You guys, for some reason this really made me tear up. She’s gotten so big!!! And what a great pair they make.

    Yeesh. Excuse me while I find a tissue. And Happy Halloween!

    Reply

    • YoungHouseLove says

      Thanks N Shirley! Most of my family lives in Jersey so they have been keeping us posted and even gave us a place to stay (we showed up to learn our hotel had no power).

      xo,
      s

  26. Ash says

    Soooo cute! And I don’t know if it was just from seeing this earlier in the day, or from all the totally adorbs kids I had for 3 straight hours on Wednesday at my door, but I totally dreamed on Wednesday night that I baby-sat for you guys when you came the Pacific Northwest on your book tour. Crazy!

    Reply

  27. Michelle Kersey says

    Great job on their costumes! I’m all for making halloween costumes last beyond halloween too! I made all of our costumes this year… and I usually try to DIY as much as possible every year.

    My family as the Wizard of Oz Characters: http://flic.kr/p/dqWZ4z
    My kiddos as The Cowardly Lion and Glinda the Good Witch: http://flic.kr/p/dqX9xj

    My daughters costume will now be a princess dress for her to wear for dress up (which she has gladly already started doing!) My sons is a two piece, fleece pants and a fleece jacket, so he can wear the pants as PJ pants and the jacket for outside. :)(My first time sewing on a zipper! Success!)

    Reply

  28. Sarah M. says

    I was super proud of my costume this year, because the whole thing was stuff I either found really cheap, or had lying around. I wanted to be a ‘girlier’ version of the Hamburglar (remember, from McDonald’s back in the 90s?) and found this link: http://whatiwore.tumblr.com/post/11025705667/homemade-halloween-the-hamburgler
    Here’s my full getup, all put together: http://www.flickr.com/photos/seh0041/8162603315/in/photostream
    The accessory that totally MADE the costume was a complete after-thought. We were going to a few of the bars, and like always, I forgot to think of a way to carry my phone, ID, money, not to mention hubby’s keys, since his costume was a body-suit number. I didn’t want to carry a regular purse, being in-costume and all. Well, Halloween night my husband was on his way to the house as I was getting ready to go, and I had a stroke of genius: I had him pick up an actual McDonald’s bag to use as my purse. It was the item that got the most comments from people.

    Reply

  30. Jennifer says

    I love this! My two guys were Woody and Buzz this year (first time I didn’t make them though :( ). Tried to talk my hubs into Mr. and Mrs. Potato head, but he wouldn’t go for it. For the pet show at the fair this year I want to dress our dog like a fish, but I have to figure it out! Kid one will wear overalls with a fishing pole and kid 2 is going in a frog costume I got from Goodwill for $4. “Down at the pond”!

    Reply

  31. Sue says

    Have been reading your blog for some time now. Started it in the middle-ish, was intrigued and went to the beginning to read all of it. Just saw this post about your brother in Jersey City, that’s where my husband is from and I an from the next town over, Bayonne. Small world!
    Keep us the good work, very interesting, informative and fun! Thanks!!
    Sue

    Reply

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