Homemade Jack Skellington Toddler Costume

My daughter is two and a half, and this year would be her first time really trick or treating. When I asked what she wanted to be for Halloween, she said “JACK!”( from the nightmare before Christmas-> her favorite movie, she watches it everyday) so naturally, I started trying to find a costume online. I am on a tight budget, not the type to spend 40 bucks on a crappy polyester costume, so buying a new costume simply wouldn’t do.

I was feeling inspired and immediately made a sketch of what I wanted to make her.
I started on the bat tie, I used the inside part of an old pleather cape and cut, sewed and stuck a wire skeleton I made inside the bow tie. To tie the bow tie, I sewed on the string leftover from the cape. I used dimensional white fabric paint (about three dollars at hobby lobby) to paint on the eyes and lines.

The pants are black leggings that we already had, that I painted with the same white fabric paint.

For the shirt, I used a white button up shirt that we already had.

I wanted to get her some black Oxfords or combat boots to wear and hooray! I found some in her size at a goodwill for five bucks!

The jacket was a lucky find, it’s a boys tailcoat I found on eBay for 12 dollars I believe and I used the same white paint for the pinstripes. (It was quite time consuming because I didn’t have a mannequin and I couldn’t trust a two year old to NOT squirm while I tediously paint on stripes, it took a total of four days I think, because after painting one section of the necks I had to be able to hang it to dry ensuring it wouldn’t touch another part of the jacket) After that was done, I cut it to look like strips like jack Skellington’s jacket, I also used that paint to make the button white.
A few days before Halloween, I sprayed the strip/ends with a little starch and kind of rolled and folded them up with pin-curls clips to make them a little curly and wavy.

For her tutu, I required a strip of elastic (already had) and I got a few yards white and black tulle for a whopping three dollars or so. I sloppily cut strips (to mimic the imperfect stripes on the real Jack’s outfit) and kept them crumpled for like a day before actually using them, I then made a simple tutu by taking three or four strips of the tulle, folding them in half and slipping the ends through the folded end around the elastic.

Lastly, I felt like her costume was lacking something, so I make her a little hair clip that was just a miniature version of her bow tie.

On Halloween, she was really good about letting me paint her face and put her hair in a Bavarian style braid to keep with a round head shape. She loved her costume and was super excited to show it off. It was a huge hit in the neighborhood we went trick or treating in. :)

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