"Creativity is intelligence having fun." - Albert Einstein

 

 In our house, we have allowed our daughter to pick out her Halloween costume ever since she could talk. Little did I know it would turn into years of me racking my brain, pulling out my hair and testing my limits, to pull them off.  Generally kids would say, “I want to be a ghost or a pirate or a princess for Halloween.”  Not my daughter she has always existed outside of the box, with her thinking, and that is why I LOVE HER.  For some reason, she has come up with ideas for things, you would on no occasion, think to make into a costume, but WE DID!  A decade of costumes and my offspring has kept me on my toes for every single one of them.

With my costume making proficiencies you would at no time guess that I’m not an admirer of Halloween.  I loathe scary movies, nighttime hayrides and haunted houses. I detest being terrified; I despise seeing adolescents with hatches coming out of their heads and blood dripping down their faces.  I don’t get enthusiastic about commercial holidays and I’m not sure why grown-ups now gussy up all on their own for parties.  Where we live, children have to bundle up and brave the freezing cold just to get candy.  Wouldn’t it be easier to just buy a bag of your preferred candy, so as to; skip the wind, rain and sometimes snow blowing you from house to house? To say I don’t get it and don’t like it is an understatement.  It is however a rite of passage for tots and so I continue with tradition for my daughter.  I have always been of the mindset, if you are going to do something, DO IT RIGHT (no half assed in my world)!

 

One of the coolest things about being a new parent is that idea that you get to do all those “kid” happenings that you have been too old for and forgotten all about.  So you can imagine the first two years we had our daughter, it was thrilling to think that at Halloween, we could pick out an adorable costume and go out to flaunt her around.  For the earliest two years of trick or treating, we garbed our daughter in two exceedingly lovable, warm, fluffy and huggable costumes.  At four months old, she was a Lion, her chubby legs and plump baby fat face filled out the costume from tip to toe and made everyone roll in the aisles, when they saw her.  To date I think she was the cutest Lion, I’ve ever laid eyes on, but maybe I’m biased.  The following year, at age one, she was on the move, dressed all sweet and cuddly as a chicken.  Since she didn’t eat sweets yet, we accompanied her on visits to see family and friends and completed some trick or treating for UNICEF.  These were the lone two costumes I was allowed to pick out for my daughter, EVER!   

 

As soon as my daughter could communicate, she decided all on her own, she was making her own choices straight away.  So, I unhesitatingly asked her what she wanted to be for Halloween?  Thinking back perchance I might have been zany for bequeathing her so much power or maybe I believed it would go much different.  All I know, is from that instance onward, I would be challenged year in and year out.  Much to my disbelief at age two, she replied to my query, “spaghetti and meatballs.”  Perhaps it was because it was one of her favorite foods, I’m still not sure why she chose it?  A good number of parents would have giggled and said, “No really let’s go to the Halloween store and pick out a nice princess costume”, but not me. I’m a glutton for punishment and I crafted the costume.  At age two, she spent her initial REAL trick or treating experience as spaghetti and meatballs.  She won first place in her age group at a local costume contest. 

 

The succeeding year, we had a similar conversation; she told me that she would like to disguise herself as grapes for Halloween.  Grapes, REALLY, who wants to be grapes?  Much to my surprise, I was able to stumble on a few other eccentric people on the internet that had blazed that trail before me (keep in mind this is before Pinterest) and I set out to create a bunch of grapes. We fashioned the best bunch of grapes we could and she once more won first place, in her age group.   

 

When our fifth year of Halloween rolled around, I asked my daughter if we could possibly stay away from food for a costume and she concurred, until one day when we were grocery shopping together.  She articulated to me that she would like to be a bag of groceries!   Creative little bugger but I think she missed the point of not being food.  Constructing her into a bag of groceries was more of a challenge than I had initially thought it would be but by hook or by crook, we created a masterpiece.  Our stroke of genius was complete with a REAL head of cabbage, on top of her head! (I wouldn’t recommend this as it starts to smell.)  I will say it’s the first and only costume; I’ve had to keep refrigerated. 

 

 

 

 

 

By now, she really grasped the idea of picking a good costume, making this the year I remember her being eager to pick her next transformation.  She regularly had friends, neighbors and family asking her what she was going to be for Halloween, sometime around the end of summer.  No pressure there!  Much to their amazement, she didn’t conceive very far ahead on her costume ideas.  She would just pull them from her brain haphazardly, when I asked her at the start of October.  This was her first year in Kindergarten, and I figured she had been chitchatting with her chums at school and was going to come home this year and notify me she fancied dressing up as a cute kitty, puppy or pumpkin.  No such luck! 

 

 

She enlightened me to the fact that she wanted to be Chinese food (since of course this was her favorite food at the time).  I was beginning to deliberate that my daughter might have a problem with food or she was learning to screw with me at a dreadfully young age.  Come to find out, it is more the latter.  The Chinese Takeout costume we generated may well be my all-time favorite and possibly my daughters too, she talks about it to this day. 

 

With a little more school under her belt, I figured she would get a little bit easier on me, in the costume choosing department and I was over the moon excited when she said to me in first grade, I want to be Cinderella!  I stood in front of her and breathed a huge sigh of relief.  I figured it had something to do with our trip to Disney World or other kids at school schmoozing on about wanting to be princesses.  My girl was finally going to be a NORMAL kid at Halloween, one that didn’t need helpers to get her to the door to ring the bell, the one that the other kids didn’t stare at and wonder what she was.  Thank the gods above, we could go to the store and pick out the prettiest Cinderella costume you’ve ever seen.  Just as the air was filling my lungs back up, she said, the words, “In a Snow globe.”   After a long pause, I replied, “Come again?”  She grabbed up one of her Disney snow globes and answered, “Like this.”   Seriously, how can this be? Time to get creative ONCE AGAIN! 

 

 I pulled it off and it worked out well but this costume turned out to be rather large and not very convenient for trick or treating.  She coped and made it through the holiday because she discovered that she could every once in a while, take off the globe and walk around just as Cinderella.  I can’t tell you how many times I burnt the fingerprints off of my hands using the hot glue gun for that one!  I guess it was worth it because she was the costume she wanted to be and she received numerous compliments.

 

 

 

By second grade her tastes began to change, she wasn’t drawn to being food anymore, the princess fascination was going away and she learned that it wasn’t fun to carry around a colossal costume when ringing doorbells.  She had decided this year she was going to keep her costume simple (her words, not mine), which I concurred with.  That was the year the allure with space began and so she declared she planned to be the Solar System for Halloween.  That’s what I get for reading books way above her head for years, teaching her to dream big and telling her anything is possible.  Seriously, the ENTIRE freakin’ solar system, how is that simple?

 

 

 

 

 

For this costume she was able to help out, she lent a hand with painting planets and attached the stars and astroid belt onto her clothes.  Again, we made it happen and we did a Big Bang up job, if you ask me.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Third grade presented a challenge and was the only year we improvised.  She came to me telling me she wanted to be a head on a platter, which after a few days morphed into Marie Antoinette carrying her own head (that’s what I get for letting her read a book on Marie Antoinette!).  At this point why would I expect anything less? Thank god Halloween is only once a year.  We hit up thrift stores, gathered supplies and worked exceedingly hard on pulling this off but in the end, we ran out of time. 

I did what any mother would do; I grabbed a sheet, threw it over her head and cut some holes.  It was almost ironic, the girl who came up with all those crazy creative costumes, dressed as the most basic costume ever, a ghost. 

 

She of course in her own fashion, gave her ghost a little bit of a twist and made him Italian (her idea, as she was riveted with all things Italy that year).  She added a mustache and a Fedora and Giovanni the ghost was brought to life.  It wasn’t our best work but she had just as much fun!

After being a ghost the prior year, I figured she would recognize that simple is sometimes best!  She must not have received that memo and her NOT off the rack thinking continued into this year.  What would she come up with this year?  Of course, why didn’t I think of that, a half man, half woman?  After ten years of Halloweens with this child, the element of surprise is lost on me!   Where does she come up with this stuff?  I think she is an old sole, trapped in a nine year olds body.  She sure does come up with ideas that get my creative juices flowing.  Of course I obliged as I always have.  Since she is getting so much more grown-up, we made a fun-filled day of this and spent the day together gathering supplies at thrift stores to complete this transformation. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To my daughter’s credit, I would say not only has she come up with some superior ideas, she is now able to see her vision come to life and is wonderful at picking things out to bring things full circle.  I’m not sure this year’s costume would have been as smashing, if I did it on my own.  She has the ability to see the whole picture now and she is able to see her vision from start to finish.  Boy does she make me proud.

Albert Einstein once said, “Creativity is intelligence having fun.”  I have had ten blessed years with my daughter creating her unique Halloween costumes.  The experience has been priceless.  There were tears, cuts and burns and screaming matches but I wouldn’t change any of it for the world.  I was able to use my creativity and turn my daughter’s Halloween costumes ideas into EPIC costumes that she will remember forever.  We took our intelligence and creativity and had so much fun over the years.  It is my hope that by making these bespoke Halloween costumes I have taught her how to create whatever it is that she wants.  If she yearns for something in life that is not on the rack, to go out and make it happen herself!  

Instead of thinking that there is a certain way to do things, open up your mind, think outside of the box, use your intelligence and create your fun.  Even if you don’t like something, I am proof that if you put your whole heart into it you can create something special and fun.  Get out there and show the world your intelligence through your creativity, the possibilities are endless.  The memories and fun you will create along the way will be worth it.   Parents let your kids use their brains, even if it is in an unconventional way, who knows what they will come up with?  I know that someday soon, instead of dreading the Halloween season, like in the past, I will miss the time my daughter and I spent together, using her cleverness to create those amusing costumes!  Time goes by so fast; let kids be whomever or whatever they want to be, not only on Halloween but every day of their lives.