Category: General

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Disney Costumes General

Glitter Shoes for Disney’s Frozen Elsa Costume

You can bet characters from Disney’s “Frozen” will be huge for cosplay and Halloween this year!  I will focus on many aspects of their costumes throughout 2014.  My daughters are already planning their Anna and Elsa costumes for Halloween.  I’m kicking off the “Frozen” posts with this link here to a tutorial showing how to glitter shoes for Elsa using Mod Podge and glitter.  This quick and easy process can turn any shoes, boots, or sandals into glittering goodness!  It’s pretty easy to find glitter shoes for little girls, but it becomes more difficult for adults. Using this process you can customize any shoes with exactly the glitter color you need.

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General Halloween Makeup Theater Tutorials

Old Age Stage Makeup Tutorials

It’s surprising how many shows end up having at least one character in aged makeup, so I thought I’d post a few tutorials showing old age stage makeup, including the last one which shows a simple technique for making the hair look gray.  They each show the techniques slightly different–some are better at showing the design, some emphasize product, and some are better at showing the technique.  When learning anything, it’s often helpful to get a few different opinions, so take a look and then go for it.  The key is using your actor’s own wrinkles as the design and then blending the shadows and highlights. The process is basically the same for males and females.

Please comment below or on my Facebook Page, The Costume Resource, if you need costume or hair and make-up help with a specific show you are doing.  I’d love to help out!

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Boy Costumes Ethnic costumes General Group costume Halloween Costumes Halloween Costumes for Men Refashioning

Three Amigos Kids Halloween Costume

Image by Brookie Photography
Image by Brookie Photography

Not only is this a great group costume, but isn’t this a great image? Just so stinkin’ cute.  This is from my friend who made these costumes for her son and his cousins.  These costumes are easy to make from black sweats.  The hardest part may be waiting for the silver glitter glue to dry so that you can flip the sweats to decorate another area. I dare my three girls to pull this off when they are all teenagers.  With a mustache, of course.

Three Amigos Costume Recipe

Ingredients:

Black sweat bottoms

Black zip up hoodie, or crew neck sweatshirt

LOTS of silver glitter glue

White shirt

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Couples costume Dresses General Hair Halloween Costumes Halloween Costumes for Women Makeup Movies Period Costume Refashioning Shoes Tutorials

The Roaring 20’s: Great Gatsby Costumes and Flapper Costumes for Women

This page is for all you who need a costume for a Great Gatsby, Flapper, or Roaring 20’s event.  You will see a brief overview of 1920’s costume ideas along with links to 1920’s fashion images and tutorials for hair, makeup, and 1920’s clothing.

When assembling a costume, I always consider 6 magic ingredients to make sure you look put together:

  • Hair
  • Clothing
  • Makeup
  • Shoes
  • Accessories
  • Props

Here’s the breakdown for each of these 6 magic ingredients in a women’s 1920’s costume:

Hair: Bobbed or cropped to fit under the close fitting cloche hats, waved

Link to 1920’s hair styles

20’s Inspired Fashion 

Clothing: Straight-line chemise style, sleeveless, dropped waist or no waist at all, hemlines near the knee to make dancing the new dances like the Charleston easier, straight bodices with flattened chests.  Sashes, bows, lace, beads, artificial flowers, feathers, and fringe adorned the dresses. If you would like a bit more coverage, wear a cap sleeve layering tee or wide-strap tank camisole and bike shorts, spankies, or leggings underneath the dress, although that will alter the look some.

blue flapper dress
Click image to view in Amazon
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General Movies

Hunger Games and Catching Fire Costume Ideas

In honor of the November 22 USA release of “Catching Fire”, the second in the Hunger Games movie series, I will be sharing links for Hunger Games costume ideas.  These will be helpful in case you are dressing up to attend the “Catching Fire” midnight premiere.  Even if you won’t be dressing up, these links will keep you in the loop for Hunger Games trends.

I ran across this uber-cool site called Capitol Couture that has fashion, beauty, culture, and design ideas from the Capitol– all written from the point of view of “Capitol Correspondents”.  Click here for THE site that takes you out of this world and into the Hunger Games world.  If you are a Hunger Games fan, you will love the inside scoop on Hunger Games fashion design, citizen activity, and Capitol updates.

 

 

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General Halloween Costumes Props

Props With Kids Halloween Costumes Look Good But Don’t Last

It’s official.  Most props used with Halloween costumes end up getting passed on to Mom.  It wasn’t even five minutes before we arrived at the Fall Carnival at our church when my astronaut daughter promptly gave me her not-so-cheap-but-awesome astronaut helmet complaining that it was pressing down on her shoulders.  She also dumped off her cool homemade jet pack that I had just spent about 45 minutes making this afternoon, saying it wouldn’t stay up on her shoulders.  Sure the props and accessories looked great, but in the end, most kids are all about ease and comfort.  Don’t spend too much time, money or stress on props to go with a Halloween costume. They look great in pictures, but may end up getting left by the wayside…IMG_2578

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Couples costume Family Costumes General Girl costumes Halloween Costumes Makeup Tutorials

Last Minute Homemade Halloween Costume: Skeleton Shirt and Skeleton Makeup Tutorial

The countdown to Halloween is on!  Hopefully your costumes are ready to go, or maybe they’ve even been worn already to Halloween parties over the weekend.  It seems like there are some years my kids are wearing costumes for nearly a week leading up to Halloween.

We used to attend a big family Halloween party that my brother and his family hosted the weekend before Halloween, complete with a haunted house set up in the garage.  It was LEGIT. Sadly they moved to the East coast, so no more fun family Halloween party.

We often attend a big Halloween carnival hosted at a local community center, but this year it conflicts with the Fall Carnival at our church, so we’ll attend the church party where my teenager gets to handout candy and host carnival games for the kids as they trick-or-treat among the classrooms and do a cupcake walk. Meanwhile the adults chat over a chili dinner and everyone goes home happy.

So far this year, one of my kids wore a unicorn costume to Buddy Day at karate last Friday, went to an informal Halloween party at a friend’s house as a hippie, and another daughter went as the Cat-in-the-Hat to her acting class.  These are not even their “REAL” Halloween costumes.

I digress.

In case you don’t have a costume ready and need something quick, here are two tutorials that show different methods of cutting up a t-shirt to look like a skeleton.  This would be fun to do for an individual, a couple, or a family.

The first shows a more precise method with a template, and the second video shows a much easier way.  I would cut the shirt using the freehand method from the second video, but print out the template from the first to visualize the cuts so there’s not as many as the second shirt.  It looks cool, but not as realistic as the first.  Watch them both and see which one you like. Pair up these easy-peasy skeleton shirts with black jeans and skeleton makeup. Quick, stylish, done.  This is the kind of costume every teenager wants.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MFrkYPaqj4

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Categories
General Halloween Costumes Refashioning Trick or Treat Bags

Personalized Homemade Halloween Trick-or-Treat Bags

When you put so much thought and effort into a Halloween costume, why stop when you get to the trick-or-treat bag?  I always try to customize a treat bag or container that coordinates with the costume.

My daughter is going to be Cruella de Vil this year, so this post is going to show you how easy it is to personalize a simple $2 purse from the thrift store with a few trims I already had on hand to make a fancy, fun, and flashy treat bag that will enhance her Cruella costume.  This is the purse I started with.

Cruellapurse

 

I cut a 2″ wide strip of dalmatian print fabric that was about 6″ longer than the length of the area where I was going to put it.  This extra length allows for gathers. This was leftover fabric from the dalmatian print ruffle I added to the bottom of her dress to extend it to her ankles.

 photo 1 copy 3

I used hot glue to first secure each end of the fabric where I wanted it to start and stop.  I put a drop of glue in the middle to glue the fabric down.  Then I ran a strip of glue

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General Girl costumes Halloween Costumes Refashioning Shoes

Refashioning Shoes Into Spectator Shoes

 

My daughter is going to be Cruella de Vil for Halloween this year.  She found some cool shoes at  Savers, one of my favorite local thrift stores.  She is young, but loves to wear high heels, so this chunky heel is a bit easier to walk in for her.   I refashioned these 30s style oxfords into the spectator shoes she has always wanted! So simple and easy, you just need hot glue, fabric, and trim. This is a fun way to add a pattern or color into your Halloween costume and even some bling, depending on the trim you choose.  Cruella de Vil needs dalmatian print, right?

Cruellashoes

1.  Position the edge of the fabric 1/4″ away from the opening of the shoe ( I knew I would be adding trim, so I needed just a bit of allowance), and then down to past the bottom of the shoe on the side.  It’s fine to be too long on the side because will trim it later. Start on one side of the shoe with a bit of hot glue, then move across the toe of the shoe adding hot glue along the top edge, under the fabric to secure it, until you get to the other side of the shoe at the bottom edge.  Cut around the bottom edge to trim away the excess fabric, being careful to leave some allowance.  You can trim any additional extra away as you get ready to secure the bottom edge.

photo 2

2. Unfortunately, I didn’t take pics for the next few steps.  Sorry!  After I cut away most of the excess fabric,

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Categories
Boy Costumes Cosplay General Group costume

Minecraft is Going to Be Hot for Boys Halloween Costumes

minecraft head
Click on image to purchase from Amazon

I have all girls, so my mind isn’t geared to think of costumes for boys as much, so I am always looking out for good boy costume ideas.   I was at my daughter’s karate studio for their Halloween party today and saw a boy in this green hoodie, holding the sword, and wearing Minecraft Creeper mask.  He looked like a cool cube.  You can try to make the mask and sword from cardboard and a careful paint job, but you know how kids are– sometimes you just gotta splurge to get the real thing.  Check the shipping date on Amazon or sign up for 2-day shipping with Amazon Prime.

My costuming philosophy is all about being able to reuse something you purchase as part of the Halloween costume. You know these items will be worn and played with long after Halloween, so it is a worthwhile investment in a Halloween costume!

minecraft hoodie
Click on image to purchase from Amazon
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