Family Halloween Costumes Should Be A Tradition.
Halloween 2014: The Incredibles
Hello, October!
This is the beginning of the whirlwind of coming holidays and traditions everyone starts to plan for. Around this time of the month, my family gets Halloween fever thinking about the various things we can do — Six Flags’ Fright Fest, pumpkin picking, and hayrides — but most importantly, we start planning our costumes.
Halloween 2015: The Wizard of Oz
I’m proud to say that my husband, my 18-year-old, my 14-year-old, and my 8-year-old love to do themed costumes together. It’s a tradition that everyone gets involved with, and our friends and family are pretty entertained by it too. For the past five years, my husband is left in charge of getting us started with ideas for what we can dress up as (along with the exterior decor of our home). He’s done a great job and hasn’t given me a reason to fire him — he really does have a good eye for some great, funny themes.
Halloween 2016: The Gurdians of the Galaxy
I encourage getting your family involved with dressing up for Halloween. I’m not a professional expert; but as an experienced mother, I’ve noticed benefits to using Halloween as a learning experience for my children and a way for us all to bond:
In general, when it comes to playing dress up, children use their imagination and develop creativity skills during these early stages of development. Dressing up allows your child to freely identify with a role model, which also builds self-esteem. Most importantly, dressing up encourages your child to have fun.
We actively engage our kids to reflect and think. We’re huge fans of animated and live-action comic heroes (and villains), so we reflect on the past year’s movies and TV shows that we really enjoyed to draw inspiration. From there, the kids offer suggestions on original costume ideas about stories that have at least five matching characters (since there are five of us). Then, we search Google, Pinterest, and Amazon to see what’s available for us to work with, all while staying in budget. Usually we start this process in mid-September so we’re not rushing, but this approach always keeps the kids interested and willing to participate. Also keep the weather in mind, you want to be able to show off the costume comfortably.
We’ve joined our town’s Halloween parade every year, and most people in town recognize us and love seeing our enthusiasm (and dedication to comics). It teaches our kids about the value of community and how important it is to be involved and get to socialize with others. If your town has a Halloween parade, I highly recommend participating.
Getting them involved in themed costumes at an early age helps keep them willing to continue as they get older, because they learn to expect a fun, bonding tradition. My kids never felt like they were forced to dress up, and having them contribute to the theme really gets them excited and more receptive to participating. My oldest did go through a stage in high school that she felt uncomfortable, but that’s why the town parades help. She saw that adults and teenagers have fun with dressing up too, so we’re not alone.
Halloween 2017: Harley Quinn & the Joker (The Suicide Squad)
We’ve been dressing up for the past four years, and I’m dreading when my oldest two decide it’s not cool to dress up together anymore. Fortunately, every year, they can’t help but get into the Halloween spirit. I just hope my children will continue this enthusiasm with their own and understand that, no matter how old they get, they should take excitement in things that bring them joy. My husband and I will have no problem dressing up too — even at an “old age.”
Halloween 2017: Katana, Poison Ivy & Dead Shot (The Suicide Squad)
Halloween 2018: Power Rangers
Are there any fun family Halloween traditions you do with your family? How about cool costume ideas? Let me know by commenting below!
