What is the best Halloween costume you will always remember from a book, movie, your childhood, etc. I've always liked the Karate Kid when he dresses up as a bathtub with the shower curtain so he can hide from the bullies trying to beat him up.

When I was seven or eight my older sister made me a bugs bunny costume. It was the greatest costume ever, and I will remember it always.

When i was about 9 or 10 I was Fonzie from Happy Days. My mom slicked back my hair with vasoline (THAT was not a great idea as it took forever to wash it out!!) and I wore a leather jacket, white T-shirt, and blue jeans. It was a really good costume, I got a lot of comments on it.

That same year, my sisters went as siamese ghosts. Two girls, one sheet....really funny costume, but they had to coordinate every move they made!

When  I was in 8th grade I dressed as my brother for Halloween. I borrowed one of his shirts and ties and slicked my hair back. It was great my teachers all knew who I was supposed to be because they had him 5 years earlier.

  What I remember most was going downtown to a store called Kresgees  and buying the costumes in a box.   A big tentlike plastic part that went over our bulky winter coats and masks with the mouth and eye holes.    Anyone old enough to remember those?!   One year my sister and I were panda bears, another year I was Wonder Woman.     My mom was not very creative, so we did ghosts as we were older.  

  Although, one year I went as a gypsy, and as I was going down someone's steps, my skirt fell off!  Thankfully I was not in my own neighborhood at the time!  LOL

  I do remember one year, my aunt  had a life sized Raggedy Ann  doll, and my sister was small enough to wear it, she looked adorable!  My other aunt was a nurse, so I got to go as a surgeon, in full get-up!

I don't know if it was the best Halloween costume, but when I was little dressing up as a black cat was my favorite thing.  I did that for several years.  One year in particular (this was before all the fancy Halloween stuff came out like now) she mixed up crushed charcoal and face cream to use on my face.  It's no wonder I didn't get poisoned or something.  LOL! 

I remember a few costumes I really liked.   The 1st one relly wasn't a costume it was my mom's old skirt, caridgan, and scarf from high school(50's style).  The skirt was a red plaid and I wore the scarf tied around my neck and got saddle shoes to go with it.

Another one was a Ragged Ann outfit that my mom made.  It was so cool, it had the striped leggings, the yellow 'mini' dress with little flowers and red undies and a bonnett with red yarn sewed to it.  I loved it

Finally my mom made me a full size 'nice' clown outfit along with hat it was great.  

My mom was really creative and sewed alot of my costumes..I think that is why Halloween is one of my favorite holidays.    I sure miss those old customes.

My Mom was a master at making Halloween Costumes!  I was a bat, a lion, a snake - all sorts of things. :)  This was back before you could buy a costume....

I would die if there ever was a costume from the movie Labyrinth around. Oh to dress as Sarah in her ballroom outfit, or to see a guy dressed as Jareth..oh boy..I'd drool myself to death if I saw a guy dressed like Jareth the Goblin King.

When my daughter was about 8 I dressed her as a gypsy. She had a long reddish skirt, a peasant blouse and a black lace shawl her Aunt had given her to play with [wrapped around her waist]. Hair pulled back with a small scarf and hoop earrings. She was so cute.Another year [ she was about 11]  I took my blue satin sheet and made it into a long cape, used a clothes hanger to fashion a stand up collar on it and stuffed it a little. She also wore a skating out fit and her skates. We dubbed her "Princess Arda-la on roller skates". [........Buck Rogers].  She was second place in the school contest..... only because I had helped her best friend with her costume as a southern belle and she won first place.When she was 14, and had a party at church to go to I made her a long white satin "princess" type dress [with a sweetheart neckline] and found her a white pointed hat with a pink scarf flowing from it.  A contemporary  "medieval princess".My son was always so easy, he always wanted to be  a cowboy,  Zorro or Dracula.Below is a picture of my grandkids [my DD's kids] from 3 years ago. I made the blue Cinderella dress and my DD made the 'Gus the mouse' costume for her son. Becca got a lot of use out of her dress, she also had her picture taken with Cinderella from the "Disney on Ice" show.We have a lot of fun dressing her kiddos for Halloween. This year Becca is excited to will be a cheerleader, wearing a "real" cheerleaders garb. An outfit borrowed from a friends JR high school days. Jake has a store bought costume of the Human Torch, it has a plastic head piece that looks like flames and gloves. He deemed it "awesome", so that is all that matters.

When my son was about 8 he wanted to be a fried egg...maybe a Judy Blume book character had done that?  Anyway, he wore a white sheet with big padded yellow felt yolk on the front and a long strip of "bacon" cut from cardboard with a handle on the back for him to carry.  He loved it...it was fun for us to sit in the car and watch peoples' reactions! 

Back in the mid '60s when I lived in Germany in Base housing, it was so safe to wander all over the place.  My best friend (a boy) and I would roam all over the place for hours.  We would dress up first as bride and groom and get tons of candy.  Then we would run home, switch our costumes to hobos, stash our candy and grab a new bag for more, and head out and do it all over again.  We would keep switching costumes and doing that until no one was handing out any more candy.  Then we'd dump all our treasures onto my bed and sort through a mountain of candy.  Those were the days!! 

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And in the End, the Love You Take, is Equal to the Love You Make.  ~John Lennon~

Check out this link for some simple costume ideas: http://www.standards.ed.state.vt.us/lt/hp/chp.nsf/HomePages/Corinne+Stridsberg

Halloween was always lots of fun. Mom said it was the one time in the year we could be whatever we wanted to be, so she always tried to get us to dress opposite of our personalities.

My sister and I had a clown suit and a Little Bo Peep dress with bonnet, which we alternated years for. She's older but I'm taller, so the costumes fit us both for a long time. In junior high I borrowed some bona fide "hippie" clothes from my neighbor's old chest; I also did a gypsy one year using things out of my closet and my mom's.

Mom went as a tired housewife, she borrowed our baby dolls and tied them to her legs, wore her bathrobe with a pillow stuffed to make her look pregnant, put curlers in her hair, and had a tool belt filled with baby bottles, duster, rags, and spanking paddle. It was a huge hit!

But the best costumes of all were 1) the year I went as my favorite TV character Punky Brewster- mismatched socks, jacket sleeves and hair bands, and 2) the year I wore my mom's kimono from her navy brat days in Japan. I was about 4, a towhead with blue eyes, but that didn't matter. She put my hair up in a bun, powdered my face, and painted my cheeks and lips. I even had the tabi (2-toed socks) and wooden platform shoes!

I went as mashed potatoes and gravy one year.  I had white sneakers and white sweatpants.  A sheet with a hole cut for my head to go though was belted around my waist and poufed out.  I had long brown hair, so I left it down to be the gravy.  :)

When my daughter was about 7 months...we cut the front and back of a Crunch Berry Box and used yarn to keep it on her.  I had a fushia long sleeved onsie I put on her with a matching beanie.  She was so cute...LOL

My favorite for my oldest son was when he was Pooh Bear.  His hair matched the costume perfectfully and he was adorable!!

My favorite for my youngest son was Bob the Builder.

For me...it was either approx 10 years ago in Alaska when I dressed up as Mrs. Claus complete with wig and none of my friends recognized me until I spoke.  Or two years ago when I was Cleopatra...complete with jet black wig...and none of my friends recognized me again...LOL

One year I got a Casper The Friendly Ghost costume(the 70's).You rememeber those full face plastic masks with teh elastic band? I LOVED that thing! It was a treat to get a store bought costume!

Stacy

My 6th grade year I was Cindi Lauper, my mom had spray painted my hair red, all done up with a side poneytail.  I remember taking a shower and  when the red dye started running down and streaking the tub, it scared the crap out me! I made my mom come and sit in the bathroom untill I was finished:)

Mistry...I remember those!  The rubber band to hold the mask on always caught in my hair, I couldn't breath through the mask and had no periphial vision with the darn small eye holes!  Besides the fact that the body part was probably some highly flamable fabric that could have ignited from just seeing a flame! lol.  I have a picture of me in one of those (Wonder Woman) at about 4 or 5 years old.  We bought those every year at Ben Franklin's...way before Wal-Mart made the scene in our small town.

This is the first year my kids have not let me make their Halloween costumes, and I am bummed!!!  In previous years they have been:

Red birds ( real feathers), blue birds,  a cell phone, a bubble bath, a robot, a black cat, Cat in the Hat, princess, and a witch.  The birds actually won a local contest.  But now it's all about the store bought stuff :(

My forever favorite costume was when I was 3 or 4 I was a little gray mouse. I don't know if my mom made it or bought it. I wish we still had it so that my daughter's could wear/have worn it.

ETA: Another favorite was when I was 8. My mom made me into a Jack in the Box.

My favorite halloween costume worn by a fictional character would be the ham costume Scout wore in "To Kill A Mockingbird."  Said costume saved her life.

I think my favorite Halloween costume, was one I made for my son when he was 3.  He had this purple unitard kind of thing that we attached purple balloons to.  He was a bunch of grapes.  Couldn't sit once it was on, but it was great. 

I love to sew, so I was so happy when I was able to make my one-year old son's first Halloween costume.  It was a tiny leopard print suit complete with ears and tail. I made his last one, a Dracula cape when he was in high school.  Over the years, I've made pirate suits, clown outfits, robots and even, an E. T. suit that won first place in the costume contest at our local mall. There were several other E. T. costume wearers there but my dad and I had rigged up a small pencil shaped flashlight inside the hand of the costume so that the finger lit up!  A few years ago, with the help of my sewing machine for the long black cape and our local thrift store for the rest of the outfit, my teenage daughter made a wonderful Hermione Granger complete with a Nimbus 2000 broom. I hope my children have as happy memories of Halloween as I do!