Halloween is fast approaching, and you are never too old to dress up in costumes and go trick-or-treating or have a Halloween party. Sometimes the complicated nuances of costumes may slip your mind, or you may not feel compelled to peruse the streets in the same overdone, boring costume as everyone else. For those of you looking for some more creative options, here are a few “do it yourself” costume ideas you should consider!
1. Cactus
As far as cacti can see, the cactus is a magnificent and majestic desert dweller. It’s prickly on the outside but has a strong, sturdy body that lasts over centuries. Dressing up as a cactus could be an amazing celebration of being a Tucsonan. It’s simple! All you need is a green long-sleeved shirt, brown pants, pink tulle, glue, a hair clip, and white string.
- Cut the white string into 1.5 inch long pieces. These will be the spikes of your cactus. Take three pieces of string and glue them onto the green shirt. Repeat until you have enough spikes.
- Fold the pink tulle back and forth, like an accordion. When you do this, you’ll get a long rectangle. Fold the rectangle in half vertically. Glue one side of your folded accordion onto the hair clip to imitate flower petals.
- Put on your outfit! The pants will be the pot for your cactus (which is the shirt) and the pink tulle is the cactus flower. You look beautiful.
2. The Sun and Moon
Do you like complementing costumes with your friends? This is the perfect DIY for you! As desert people, the sun is a very important part of our life. It gives us our famous 110 ̊F summers, beautiful sunsets, and skin cancer. Just as important as the sun is our moon. Beautiful, glowing, and mysterious, the moon has the power to move the tides. Partner up and create an atmosphere with this cool DIY! You will need color-coordinated clothing, and shades (lots and lots of shades) to complete this process.
- If you are the sun, wear all yellow, or as much yellow as you can. (If you want to imitate sun rays, spray your hair with yellow hair color--temporary)
- If you are the moon, dress up in gray and go ahead and spray your hair with gray as well.
- If you wish to take this to the next level, have the person who is dressing up as the moon be in all black clothing and make sure they constantly stand in front of the sun. You will have become a solar eclipse. - - - Wear your shades and bring some to pass around: no one should look at an eclipse without eye protection.
3. Flash Flood
Tucson is notorious for flash floods, especially during the summer monsoon season, when they come by at dangerously high speeds. Somehow, despite the possibility of drowning, the sudden flood is also very refreshing. With this costume, not only will you stay cool during the likely heat on Halloween, you will also play into Tusconans’ greatest nightmare, raining terror upon all you meet. You will need blue clothing and many variations of water bottles. The more water you have, the better the costume.
- Make or print a shirt with a sign saying “Beware: Flash Flood”
- Dress in all blue.
- Constantly be pouring water on yourself with water bottles or jugs of water.
4. Tarantula
What is one of your greatest fears? Chances are, you probably thought spiders. It is one of the most common fears, as said by the web, but that’s okay. Just leg go of your fears and be a very friendly tarantula. Terrify everyone else while easing your own fear. Even try decorating your house with a spider theme and create intricate webs of string that trap any trick-or-treaters. Here are the ingredients needed: black clothing, black fabric, black pipe cleaners, glue, googly-eyes, and sewing material (optional).
- Wear all black
- Take black fabric and sew or glue into the general shape of tarantula legs. You only need four, because your arms and legs constitute the other four limbs. If you want, you can stuff your legs with the fabric of long pipe cleaners so that they hold their shape.
- Stick two googly-eyes on your forehead, off to the side of your own eyeballs. To keep this illusion, glue down your eyebrows and cover with concealer.
- To add the tarantula’s pincers near their mouth, take two black pipe-cleaners, shape them into curved pincers, cover them with black fabric, and stick them on the corners of your mouth using spirit gum or any other SFX glue or skin-safe glue.
5. Dehydration
Here in the desert, we are all very familiar with a little something called dehydration. The arid atmosphere and high temperatures can drive us to crazy levels of fatigue. Instead of actually hydrating, try embracing your dehydration by becoming it. To achieve the dehydration costume, impersonate a zombie. - Shuffle around, with a pale face (use white face paint) and cracked lips (avoid chapstick the whole day) and repeatedly ask for water in a hoarse voice.
- Create fake sunburns on your body, as if you just walked through the Sahara Desert and carry around a clear, empty water bottle.
Written by Sheela, Kira, and Karen