Unique Homemade Halloween Decorations & Homemade Halloween Costumes For Kids

Wen I was a child, we lived in the High Arctic, in the tiny village of Aklavik, near the mouth of the mighty McKenzie River. The local stores didn't hold much in the way of ready-made costumes for Halloween, but that didn't stop my parents. Every year was an adventure in creative costume construction. Living in a remote community didn't stop them from creating some of the best homemade halloween costumes for us a person could ever imagine.

My dad was then a very junior navy hand, and we didn't have a lot of money for extras, certainly not for anything as frivolous as store-bought costumes, decorations or party favors - not as long as there was a large supply of inexpensive colored paper available, and three eager young children to help carry out the party plans.

Over the next three or four evenings after supper was over and the dishes cleared away, Dad would turn on the radio, and we would all gather round the table, scissors and mucilage bottles (old-fashioned glue) at the ready.

Already practiced from making red and green paper chains to festoon the Christmas tree, we knew the drill.

While we listened to the latest installment of "Mystery Theater", we quickly set to work cutting strips from the black and orange construction paper, and then gluing the stacks of strip into interlocking links.

It took some doing, but we created several long chains in alternating Halloween colors. Once Dad strung them about the living room in looping swags, our Halloween decor was beginning to take shape.

The next step was to cut out pumpkin shapes in several sizes from the black and orange paper. We made two oranges pumpkins for each black one.

Then we drew lines on the orange shapes for the segments, and outlined the eyes, noses and their grinning, grimacing mouths.

After cutting out the eyes, noses and gap-toothed grins, the orange pumpkins were glued to the front and back of each black pumpkin shape, we strung a thread through each stem.

We then gathered them into clusters and hung them at the end and center loop of each of the swagged paper chains.

The effect as the clusters of orange and black pumpkins swayed and bobbed at the slightest movement of the air, twirling and grimacing at the ends of their threads, was quite wonderful to our children's eyes.

While we were busy with the paper chain swags and double sided pumpkins, our parents were both working on their own tasks - Mom with our costumes, and Dad with more creative Halloween decor.

Dad had spent the first evening shredding newsprint and old scrap paper into a large pail. Then he added water and some white glue and mixed it thoroughly into an oatmeal consistency, to create paper mache.

This night, he blew up some balloons to almost bursting, and began covering them with mushed-paper goop, patting it gently into place. Once he had a smooth, even coat on each balloon, he set it carefully aside to cure.

The drying process took several days. Every evening, Dad would check them for dryness and cracks, As well as making any spot repairs to major cracks, he carefully pasted strips of dampened newsprint over each balloon, building up a gradually thickening layer - a paste and paper crust.

Watching him moisten each strip in the pail, drawing it skillfully through his hands to straighten and flatten it before applying it to the balloon, I was struck by his total concentration. He was completely in the moment, a slight smile softening his usual austere expression.

It was one of those rare and lovely epiphanies. I saw my father with a preternatural, almost crystal clarity that penetrated his normal workaday facade to reveal the intensely creative, gentle man inside the slightly stern, competent father-figure he presented to the world.

...and while Dad was busy creating paper pumpkins which he later painted and carved to look like real jack o lanterns, Mom was busy working her magic with pink, yellow, green and brown crepe paper.

First she fashioned sleeve bands, kind of like the ones old-fashioned bank tellers used to wear. Then she traced leaf shapes on the green crepe paper and cut them out, tacking each leaf's stem to the band with a few quick stitches of her needle and thread. She then repeated the process to make arm bands for both me and my sister.

Once those were completed, she traced out much larger shapes on the pink and yellow crepe paper, cutting dozens of these petal shapes, tacking them onto the waist bands. Starting with the largest petals, she completed two layers all the way around the waist band before moving to the next size smaller.

The next two layers were stitched on over the larger petals. She continued in this manner until she had created a full, fluffy, flower-like skirt.

The last layer was fashioned of green leaf shapes to form a calyx. My calyx and arm bands , which were tacked on just above the elbow, were brown, because I was a Brown-Eyed Susan, complete with brown tights and a dark brown sweater to complement my fluffy yellow petals.

My sister's were green as she was a Rose, and looked very fetching in her multi-tiered pink skirt over dark tights and a dark green sweater.

We already had the sweaters and tights, so the only cost for the costumes, besides the hours of work our mother put in on them, was the price of four rolls of crepe paper, or about four to six packages by today's standards.

I know she and Dad stayed up well into the night to finish our costumes, because by the time the day of the school Halloween party rolled around, we also had matching, adorable flower-petal hats to complete our beautiful homemade Halloween costumes.

By the end of October in the Arctic, winter has set in, so getting to school with them under our winter gear was quite a job in itself. We were very careful to help each other in and out of our parkas so as not to lose too many petals.

That Halloween was so many years ago, but I still remember the costumes and the many hours our creative parents put into including us in their own party preparations, and the lovely costumes they made so we could be the flower-belles of the ball.

© 2009 Text by Elle Fredine, All rights reserved