Boo-tiful costumes

Jill Boogren of Minneapolis knows the key ingredient to any do-it-yourself Halloween creation: one heaping dose of skepticism. Two years ago, her then-5-year-old son, Miles, found a dragon costume online that could be made "in one evening." Boogren knew better and gave it a month. Patience paid off, though, with a delightful dragon shooting red "flames" and bearing sharp teeth, which sugar-infused Miles no doubt brushed for a full three minutes before bedtime.

Boogren (and how could we resist a name like that in a Halloween story?) was one of about two dozen readers eager to share their tricks for creating great costumes for kids. The treat is that many really did take just a few hours. We oohed, aahed and laughed out loud at boxy robots and a cave baby, an ice cream cone and piece of pizza, a headless wonder, fairies, rattlesnakes, witches and more. Oh, my!

We heard from a few big kids, too, such as Eldon Vaselaar, a 20-year-old student at St. Mary's University studying history and political science. He liked his pope costume so much that he wore it the past two years.

Brave Beth Overstad, 57, sent us a 50-year-old photo of herself as "Mess America," created by her resource-limited mother, Betty Jensen King. King created her daughter's sash from a torn sheet, then added mismatched clothing, dirty tennis shoes and a hat from an aluminum foil pie plate. "I returned home with a lot of loot!" Overstad wrote.

But nobody was prouder to have created something from nothing than King. "A few weeks ago," Overstad wrote of her mother, who died last year, "I discovered she had saved the sash all these years."

Jill Boogren of Minneapolis crafted this dragon two years ago for son Miles, then 5: "We did small parts of the costume one at a time. We assembled materials one day, measured and cut out pieces another, painted, painted again and pulled it all together. The head, tail and feet were made of cardboard, the tail was attached by a belt, the feet by shoelaces. Miles wore a green sweatshirt and sweatpants. The wings were made out of bubble wrap and pinned to the sweatshirt sleeves. At night, we attached red cellophane, lit by a small flashlight for flames."

Eldon Vaselaar, 20, a student at St. Mary's University, wore this two years running: "The pope costume was made using yards of white felt. The trim was hand-sewn, as was the satin ribbon. The miter [hat] was made by taking plastic graph craft sheets, cutting them into the shape of the miter, using spray adhesive to add felt, then sewing the pieces together and hand-sewing the trim. The back trim/ribbon has two curtain tassels sewn to each of the ends. Underneath is a vintage cassock saved from a scrap heap."

Proud Dennis Madison of Ramsey helped his grandsons, Michael and Connor Reed, ages 6 and 8, create these fun characters. "Michael said, 'Bampa (that's what he calls me), if you glued two boxes on top of each other and cut eye holes, I would look like a robot.' We went from there. The boxes were painted with silver paint, the arms were dryer vent tubing, and the rest was stuff I had or found at the dollar store. On the back, not shown in the picture, is a nuclear hazard warning sticker we hand-made."

Rona Vaselaar was in fifth grade when she wore this award-winning costume made by her mom, Meredith Stanton Vaselaar of Adrian, Minn.: "Rona's one rule was that she be completely unidentifiable. The arms are fake, stuffed with fiber; the gloves were sewn to the cuffs, then sewn together to hold the pumpkin. Rona's arms are hidden underneath the shirt and clasped behind her back. The lace in front of the shirt hid the very small eye-holes we built in so she wouldn't bump into things. At the very top was a vent in the box to support the torso. Nevertheless, it was hot and miserable. To this day, however, Rona claims it was well worth the misery. And it was one of the least expensive costumes I ever made. I found the shirt, trousers and boots at a thrift store for $4 total; the whole costume cost under $15.

Karen Trygstad made costumes for her boys, Zack and Connor, every year, until they were "old enough to embarrass." They're 12 and 16 now: "I wanted a costume that you could put over a snowsuit, because you never know in Minnesota what the weather can bring. And because my husband, Brian, would always take the boys, I made one for him, too! In October 1999, they were three-headed monsters. We created the look from old nylon socks stuffed with batting, eyes cut out of magazines, old hats on top, nips and tucks in the nylon to create a nose and mouth. We attached the heads with safety pins to old hunting jackets."

Cathy Broberg of Lino Lakes made this for daughter Sophia: "My husband cut a thin piece of plywood into a circle and cut a hole through the center. He attached a small dowel for a handle. Then we got out the handy-dandy hot glue gun and glued on a plastic tablecloth, napkin, plastic glass, vase and salt and pepper shakers. Yarn for spaghetti and felt for sauce were glued onto a paper plate and set around her neck after the table was in place. We took an inexpensive baseball hat and glued more felt and yarn on it, plus a few brown craft balls for meatballs. We eventually added a plastic fork to the spaghetti on her hat."

Colton Johnson, 10, of White Bear Lake isn't much for superheroes, so last year his mom, Tami Johnson, got creative: "Colton wore brown pants for the trunk and a green hooded sweatshirt. I purchased leaves on a vine at Michael's, cut them off and safety-pinned them to the green sweatshirt. We found a bird's nest and pinned that to his shoulder. He also had a squirrel attached with a hair binder, and he walked around with a rake."