diy costume

DIY HALLOWEEN FOR LITTLES – LUKE DANES, GILMORE GIRLS

Okay y’all, this one is purely for my own enjoyment. Baby Luke Danes.
This was just all pulled from Max’s closet and a Little Tikes kitchen set! NO CELL PHONES!
ALL YOU NEED:
Blue baseball cap, backwards
Plaid shirt. Literally any color- Luke wears a different plaid every single day.
Grey undershirt
Jeans
Coffee pot
Lovable scowl
Gilmore Girls fans rejoice! Only a couple more weeks until the revival!
Oy with the poodles already!
xo
-L
MORE HALLOWEEN COSTUMES…
Lots of ideas HERE

DIY HALLOWEEN – ELEVEN’S EGGO WAFFLE PURSE, STRANGER THINGS

Who’s dressing up as Eleven for Halloween? Well you’ll need an Eggo waffle purse to complete the look. Obviously. 
This purse actually works!! You can open and close it- probably just put the essentials in there since it’s not too sturdy. It’s easy to make and will be the talk of your party! Don’t forget the bloody nose. 
WHAT YOU NEED:
– 2 empty Eggo waffle boxes
– scissors / exacto knife
– hole punch
– double stick tape
– clear packing tape
INSTRUCTIONS:
1. eat all the waffles.
2. using double stick tape, secure the side of the box that you opened to get the waffles out.
3. cut the top off of the first box. You can leave a little border around it but you don’t need to.
4. cut all of the sides off of the second box. Keep the sides to reinforce the purse even more.
5. you have 4 flaps now. Line the insides of the BOTTOM and BACK flaps only with double stick tape. Make sure to leave the top two flaps without tape since that’s where the purse will open. I made that mistake if you can’t tell by the torn cardboard!
6. stick the second box to the first using the tape. Bottom to bottom, back to back. Again the top two flaps should remain tape-free.
7. reinforce the flap of the second box to the first box with clear packing tape. For extra security and some shine, you can line the whole inside flap with tape.
8. For the chain…since your hole punch probably isn’t strong enough to punch a hole through three layers, you’ll need to go one layer at a time. Punch a hole on each side of the box about an inch down from the top. Depending on size of the chain attachments, you may have to make a couple slits on either side of the hole like I did, but you can’t really see it. Using double stick tape, attach the extra sides from the second box on top of the first box sides to make it sturdier. Line up your hole punch and punch a hole through the new side. Put clear packing tape on the inside of the box sides and punch a hole through that. Now you should have three layers (two box layers and one tape layer) all lined up. 
9. Now you can thread your purse chain through and attach it to itself. You can adjust the chain strap at this point. Link to purchase the chain strap is below. This one is actually from clutch I own!
10. reinforce any or all sides on the inside of the box with clear tape if you want it to be really sturdy.
11. attach the velcro to the opening.
12. be the chicest Eleven at your Halloween party!
Please tag us on instagram @loveandlion in your costume photos!! We would love to see what you come up with!
xo

DIY HALLOWEEN COSTUME FOR LITTLES – SADNESS

Have you seen Inside Out? It’s. So. Good. If you’ve seen Inside Out and didn’t cry, then you are a robot my friend. Sadness is my son’s favorite character! He just thought she was hilarious. He has a stuffed Sadness doll he sleeps with every night and makes up jokes and songs in her voice. He’s having a Sadness-themed birthday party next month and it was an obvious choice for Halloween!
Try to find a Sadness costume. Just try. They don’t exist. So let’s make one, shall we?
First, you’ll have to give your wig a Sadness haircut. THIS is the one I ordered. The quality was amazing but it’s NOT at all what it looked like! It was super long! Chop the right side and the back short and straight across. The left needs to get longer in the front. I trimmed the bangs to just above Ari’s eyes. Then I used a curling iron to flip up the ends on long side and swoop the bangs over to the left. Spray with hairspray to set.
I ordered glasses from Amazon and they came in totally different from the image, but they worked really well I think.
There are NO children’s turtleneck sweaters anywhere! This is a woman’s sweater from Forever 21 that I’ll probably keep for myself.
The face paint went very easily and dried quickly. A little tricky to get off, but Ari didn’t seem to mind!
SOURCES:
Jeans – H&M
Shoes are old! Any blue shoes will do.
Sadness attitude:
“Trick or treeeeaaat. Halloween makes me saaaaaad”
See more of our DIY Halloween costumes HERE
-L

DIY FAIRY COSTUME + EDUCATIONAL ART PROJECT

It’s always nice to sneak in some educational concepts when you’re playing with your littles! My 4.5-year-old, Ari, needed a costume for a school carnival this weekend and beeeeeeegged me to buy a Tinker Bell costume. I did NOT want to go out in traffic to buy one and spend the money. I thought it would be much more fun to make it! But wait… we’re out of green paper. That’s okay, we’ll use paint! Oh **** we’re out of green paint. Ummm…. 
Ari’s really into experiments and potions and magic, so we refreshed our color theory lessons and made all different shades and tints of green.
 Just blue, yellow, and white! 
I put blobs of blue, yellow, and white all over a piece of butcher paper and let the kids go to town. They came up with the most beautiful colors! And Max had a nice snack of paint (OMG that kid!!).
When the paper was dry, I drew leaf shapes with a thick sharpie and cut them out. Just freehand it, really anything will look good outlined in black!
I used safety pins to attach to a green sweater and baseball hat. We borrowed fairy wings from our friend, and voila! Tink!

 Yep… those are jammie pants.
Max went as Danny Zuko at the end of Grease 🙂
Love your children every minute of every day!
-L

HOMEMADE HALLOWEEN COSTUMES FOR LITTLES

Well it’s not even mid-September… so naturally it’s time to post about Halloween. I was in Hobby Lobby today and was like…crap! Already? I wanted to share Ari’s past Halloween costumes with you if you’re into DIY’ing it. I totally got away with my choices when he was too little to come up with something himself, but this year it’s his choice. Whomp whomp. Wild Kratts it is!
DIY HALLOWEEN COSTUMES
1. HARRY POTTER
This one is my absolute favorite! You know what a Harry Potter nerd I am. We tell Ari Harry Potter stories (the non-scary ones) now, so he loves looking at this picture of himself!
Outfit: khaki or black pants, white button down shirt, black or gray vest or v-neck sweater
Scarf: I knit this using this pattern
Glasses: here. I popped the plastic lenses out
I used an eye liner pencil for the lightening shaped scar 🙂

2. MARTY MCFLY
I still giggle at this one. Ari still doesn’t really get who he was but people loved it! The Back to the Future Trilogy is one of Jeffrey and my favorite movies (next to HP obvs). 
Outfit: jean jacket, white button down with blue/red plaid, maroon t-shirt, red suspenders, red puffy vest, tight light wash jeans, white Nike high tops
“Look at them moccasins!”

3. THE ORKIN MAN
Ari is obsessed with our Orkin man, George. I think he thinks of George as a grandpa?? George retired last year, so it was only fitting to pay homage to him.
Outfit: white button down, pleated khakis, red hat
Details: I made the epaulets out of red felt with a white button sewed on. I just winged it whip stitched them on the shoulders BUT I did it backwards. The button side is supposed to point towards the neck of the shirt.
You can download the Orkin logo I made here.
Stick on eyebrows/mustache found at a costume shop.
I covered Max in little plastic spiders to make it more Halloween-y!
Tutorial for the spray can is below. There was probably a way easier way like using a silver coffee can, but I used what I had!
Punch a hole through the oatmeal can top for the rubber tube (bought at a hardware store)
Tape the tube inside and on the top of the can
Punch holes for the string before you tape the top on
Wrap can and hose with duct tape
4. CARDINAL
I made this for Ari’s preschool costume, but count it anyway as a great Halloween DIY.
Tack/sew red boa around the turtleneck. I used yellow felt for the feet and attached it to Ari’s crocs. For the hat, I glued felt on top of a foam visor from the craft store. You could always just stick feathers on a red hat and call it a day!

5. BABY NERD
This was my laziest costume but effective. Max already had the white onesie, cardi, and bowtie. I just put masking tape on Ari’s Harry Potter glasses (above)!
Even though Ari is almost four and picking out his own costume this year… there’s always hope for Max!
-L