Halloween Costumes.

[crazychicknlady]

I went shopping for Halloween costumes yesterday with the kids.

In years past we have made due with old costumes, gifts, dress up and even dollar store costumes. Definitely Halloween on a budget. I'm good at keeping us on a budget, but now that we are not hurting for cash I'm able to indulge my desires a little more.

And, make no mistake, this was definitely about my desires - it just so happens they aligned really well with the kids' desires too.

By the time we were done (hit three stores) the kids were happy, they each found a costume - H a stealthy ninja, S a majestic queen and C Spiderman. We didn't have to do this. We could have made due this year too. We could have gone to Goodwill as one friend suggested.

But I didn't want to.

I think this was satisfying something missing from my childhood. The classic do for your kids what you never got to have yourself. As far as I can remember we never got to go out and buy new costumes when I was a kid. We still had costumes, we still had the excitement, we still trick-or-treated, got lots of candy and had fun. We just didn't have the extra money to throw away on one shot use costumes.

As it turns out, we kept the damage to under 40 bucks. C wore his costume most of the evening, and all three kids dressed up to practice trick-or-treating. We have a party at M's old work, where costumes are encouraged, and still have Halloween on Sunday, so the costumes will get to be more than one shot throw aways anyway (which helps calm the frugal maniac living inside of me ;-).

I also fully expect to see spiderman wandering around the house from time to time throughout the rest of the year and probably well into next year if the costume doesn't fall apart first.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I suggested Goodwill because a good friend of mine has made me a thrifier shopper. I love that about you.

[crazychicknlady.livejournal.com]

Thanks :)

I had to fight my inner frugal monster at one point. Nearly scrapped the whole thing while looking at the crap overpriced costumes at Wally World.

I've spent so many years not spending money in places other people don't even think about, I have to remember it's okay to blow a little here and there. And we can afford it at this point.

But I still pack M a lunch for work everyday, and my living room couch is our futon from the old house, so I'm still on the straight and narrow most days ;-).

[(Anonymous)]

Whew! You had me worried.

[catnip13.livejournal.com]

Kaia wound up with that same Majestic Queen dress - she's expressed a last minute desire to be Susan from Narnia for Halloween, so we're adding a bow and quiver of arrows to it. Her grandma was nice enough to spring for the dress, since we really can't afford it right now.

She's gotten a new costume, purchased or made, every year. She hasn't tended to pick that costume to wear trick or treating the last couple of years - last year her new costume was a fancy fancy witch dress, she spent most of the day as a purple and pink ladybug, and then swapped for a lion costume (found at a garage sale for a dollar 3 years ago when it was still far too big for her) at the last minute. She's got a fairly extensive costume collection, mostly from garage sale and thrift store finds. I have no issue with this, she wears them all the time.

[crazychicknlady.livejournal.com]

All three kids got into their costumes again earlier. They played hide-n-go-seek in them, with most of the lights off, so H could use her black costume to full advantage.