Jungle Red Writers: The Reds Dress Up for Halloween

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Do you love to dress in costume? For Halloween, I mean. When I was little, ALL I wanted to be was a princess–and Mom made me a magical outfit. She took an opalescent pink plastic shower curtain and wove a pink ribbon through the holes, and then tied it around my neck for my beautiful cape. (Whoa, thinking about that now, would we tie something around a kid's neck? Whatever, I lived to tell the tale.) But I loved it. Then she got a piece of silver poster board, and twisted it into a cone, and stapled it for a pointy hat, then put a pink floaty scarf through the top, and then elastic under my chin for my BEAUTIFUL princess hat. Oh, I LOVED it, and I swanned around in for DAYS. Until the whole thing fell apart.

No photos of it exist, sadly.

In college, we had to dress up as a popular song, so I dyed a white sheet black (a MESS, truly, do NOT do this) and then put it on like a ghost sheet, and went as the 45 record “She’s Not There.” (It was subtle, I admit.)

And listen to this. Once a boyfriend and I rigged up an unbelievably elaborate rectangular wooden form, which we covered with a red and white checked table cloth. We used ropes to hang it over our shoulders. Then we got poster board, and made it into a cone big enough to fit both of our heads through the hole. Then I made spaghetti, and tried to glue it to the poster board cone. (You have to imagine trying to glue spaghetti, MASSIVE fail, so I ended up sewing it to the cone.) Then we got two brown paper bags, and covered them with glued-on cotton balls,and sprayed all the cotton balls a mixture of red and brown. Then we made eye holes in the cotton-ball covered bags. Then we got into the cone of spaghetti, slung the ropes over our shoulders, then put the cotton ball bags over our heads, tied them around our necks (theme!) and we were a plate of spaghetti and meatballs on a table.

It was AWESOME.

Someday I will tell you about the moment that we realized we had to drive ourselves, AND that contraption, to the party.

The next year-- in 1984!-- I was a tea bag. See? Yes, that's me as Constant Comment. (It took me SO long to create and fill in that tag!)

I tore brown tights and a brown leotard. Then I tore up brown paper shopping bags into tiny pieces. Put them into a clear dry cleaning bag, and made a pouch. Then I stepped inside tied it around my neck (theme!) with the tag on a string. And the other person was dressed as Hunter S. Thompson, who I met that night–a true meet-cute--and we clicked because I was the only person who knew who he was supposed to be. (We dated for a year, then he left town to follow a traveling circus and shoot a documentary.)

And Jonathan and I made a pretty satisfying Bellatrix Lestrange and Dumbledore. (My wand is the stem from an artificial rose, I just cut off the flower.) Jonathan is wearing two of my necklaces, and that skirt and top are in my party wardrobe. I just never wear them together like that.We bought Jonathan's hat, and his "robe" is just burlap with a hole cut for the neck.

How about you, Reds and readers? What’s the best Halloween costume you’ve ever worn? Or have ever seen?

JENN MCKINLAY: I think the best one I’ve ever created/worn was when my college girlfriends and I made ourselves into Coors Light Cans with the logo “Reach for a Silver Bullet Tonight” on the back (it was soooo 1987). So ridiculous and fun!

Of course, the Hooligans LOVE Halloween and their costumes were always so much fun! From Batman and Robin to Death and the Crash Test Dummy. LOL.

The best Halloween costume I’ve ever seen was online. A dad made his kids actual Transformer costumes where the kids could turn from the robot to the truck or car. It was amazing. Here’s the youtube: https://youtu.be/fndYxbykd8k

HANK: Jenn! Awesome!

RHYS BOWEN: I didn’t grow up with Halloween, although these days it is as big in UK as it is here. But when my kids were growing up I spent a lot of time making costumes. I remember Clare went once as a tree. One of them went as a dragon with a long tail that kept falling off. Then in the elementary school years when it’s important to conform there was the period of bought costumes. Princesses, Star Wars, witches etc. Then high school they became creative again. Clare once went as the character from Dragonslayer with a dragon on her shoulder. I’ll see if I can find a picture of it.

John and I attended several adult parties but always went as something easy to make. My favorite was John as the devil. Me as a fallen angel. We had to stop a group of teenagers in a dark area to ask for directions. A boy gave them then noticed John. “You have horns!” he said in a horrified voice. “Yes, I’m the devil,” John replied as we drove off.

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Oh, wail!! I'm such a fail on Halloween costumes!! I've NEVER had a really good one. Although my mom could sew, she ranked a big zero on the costume creative front (bless her) so mine were always store-bought. And as I can't sew, and as my mom apparently passed on that big fat ZERO to me, I've never made anything remarkable. The best one I can think of is one year I was a gypsy fortune teller, complete with 8-ball, but alas no pics.

Maybe I need to add "Wear a really good Halloween costume" to my bucket list…

LUCY BURDETTE: I love those pictures! Especially the one of Rhys and John as Devil and Angel! I have not dressed up lately, though I can assure you there are plenty of opportunities in Key West. My very favorite costume was one I made in graduate school, where I went to a party as Wonder Woman.

Honestly, we had much more fun than we had any business having while getting our PhD’s! As you can see, this choice was more about what would look cute than how clever I could be. I think this must have been 1982. I still have the costume up in the attic waiting for granddaughter Thea I suppose. Maybe I should pack it up and send it to her just in case she knows who WW is…

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I never had a store-bought costume as a child, and so, even though I wasn’t as ambitious as my mother, I did sew several and pulled together others with a little help from Goodwill. My kids were, variously, a witch, a leopard, Old King Cole, a glamour witch, Batman, a princess, a princess fairy… two daughters, lots of sparkles and tulle.

As an adult, I had a few banger costumes, starting with going to the Midnight Hallowe’en screening of Rocky Horror Picture Show as a very authentic Magenta. I had an amazing night in London dressed as a Gay Nineties Chorus Girl (my friends and I went to a fancy dress rental place for our costumes that year, as none of us had brought any in our junior-year-abroad luggage.) For a New Year’s Eve party with a theme of “Come as an important news event,” I was infant Prince William, in adult-sized footsie pajamas with a British flag pinned to the rear flap.

And my favorite, the year I sewed matching Robin Hood and Maid Marion outfits for me and Ross. We won a prize!

HALLIE EPHRON: We made our own costumes growing up and I’ve always been lousy at it. My kids, whom we tortured by not letting them buy store-bought costumes, are aces now at Halloween costumes.

And now my grandkids benefit. With a little makeup and clothing on hand, last year Francis dressed up as a slightly broken, thoroughly creepy doll.