So you’re over 21 and you’ve been invited to a Halloween party. Or, your office has decided everyone should dress up for the holiday. What are suitable Halloween costume ideas for adults? Look online and the retail Halloween costume ideas vary from the idiotic to nearly X-rated. Everyone has seen the groan-inducing cow costume, complete with a rubber udder, as well as the French maid outfit suitable for a strip club. What’s a grown-up to do?
Halloween costume ideas may borrow from the ghost and goblin tradition, the movies, fairytales or nearly anything else, including the witty costume “puzzle.” (Guess what I am!) These are all valid fodder for Halloween costume ideas.
The costume “puzzle” is usually very suitable for a work environment. A favorite idea involves very little work. The wearer just cuts out the entire front and back panels from a cereal box and wears them over the head, attached with string or fabric, like a sandwich board. However, the front of the box should have bits of cereal glued to it, with rivulets of dried glue (to look like milk) and a plastic knife plunged into the front. Voila! A “cereal killer.”
A very simple costume puzzle has the wearer in a black T-shirt with a capital “P” cut out of white paper and pinned to the shirt. The wearer outlines one eye in black eyeliner. Behold: A black-eyed “P.” A green T-shirt with paper green “T” affixed and the puzzle is obvious: green “T.” Pink lipstick around the eye? Pink-eye! Dress in a bathrobe with tissues and a thermometer in the pockets, an icepack on the head and fuzzy slippers: you’re home sick!
Some other Halloween costume ideas: Make a poncho of green felt and decorate with cheap Christmas ornaments to go as a Christmas tree. Find stuffed dog toys with open mouths and attach the mouths as though they were biting your arms and legs. You are now a dog catcher. Deconstruct the popular fairy tale by buying a Snow White outfit and ripping it up. Wear a bedraggled hair bow and carry a cardboard hatchet. Snow White just went psycho and killed the dwarfs! With a rubber pig snout and a feather boa, you can be Miss Piggy. C’est Moi!
A good place to look for Halloween costume ideas is in pattern books in the fabric stores. Most manufacturers have Halloween costume patterns. Even if you don’t want to make one of the patterns, you might get some great ideas for what you do want to wear. The Internet also has numerous ideas for adults who want something different on Halloween. Just make sure your costume doesn’t obstruct your vision, or if it does, that you can remove the obstruction to drive safely and that it isn’t too restrictive of movement. Also remember to bring a change of civilian clothes to the party so you can shed your costume if it becomes too cumbersome. But mostly, have fun and let your hair down. It’s Halloween, after all.