Persia Lou

Creative. Crafty. Fun.

DIY Jack Skellington Kid’s Costume

I was so excited last year when my son asked to be Jack Skellington for Halloween. I knew it would be a fun challenge to create a costume for him, and I had such a good time doing it. Here he is in version one of the costume:

So not the happiest looking kid there on the left, but the outfit looks pretty dang good, don’t you think? We tried face paint for Jack’s head the first time around (for a pre-Halloween party), and my son wasn’t a huge fan. So I decided to take a different approach for trick or treating. After some pinterest research, I found this great hat that inspired me to quickly crochet up a new jack skellington head for my little man.
See? Much happier! And so cute, I think. (Sorry about the quality of these photos… I was not in a blogging state of mind last year, so we are working with what we’ve got.)
I will give you a little run down of what I did to create this costume in case you want to put one together for someone in your life.
I started with a pair of black pants that my son had that I didn’t really like the fit of. I took in the pant legs significantly to make them more like a pair of skinny jeans (skeletons are pretty skinny, right?). I sewed up a quick jacket using a t-shirt as a guide, and left the edges unfinished simply using a zig zag stitch to finish them off.
Next came the most time consuming part of the whole process. Painting on all of those stripes! I could have used a pinstripe fabric, but I knew hand painting would give it a look much closer to the original Jack. I used a brush and white screenprinting ink, which goes on much more opaque than most fabric paint.
Then my favorite part of the costume, Jack’s bat bow tie. I created a little stuffed bat head using fabric, batting, felt, and screenprinting ink. I shaped the face by pinching a nose and stitching it in place.
I made the bat wings stiff and shapeable by zig zag stitching over floral wire on the back side of the bow tie.
Finally, I crocheted a simple white hat and added black crocheted circles for the eyes and a yarn embroidered mouth and nose.
And – phew! – that’s it! It was probably my favorite Halloween costume I’ve made to date. Except for maybe this cute little monster:
I don’t know… tough choice.
Do you all make Halloween costumes for your kiddos? My mom always made us awesome costumes that I LOVED, so I guess feel like its part of my motherly duty.
I’d love to hear about some of your favorite costumes in the comments!

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  1. SOSOSO cute!!! I love the toes on the monster costume hahaha adorable. My mom always managed to ruin my costumes when I was younger by making me wear a sweater under everything. I dressed as a princess in Kindergarten wearing a short-sleeved pink dress with my sweater arms sticking out and looking extra bulky. Everyone asked me what I was supposed to be and why I was wearing a sweater -.-