This post was sponsored by Primary.com.

When my son Oliver was 13 months old, it was time for his second Halloween already! I knew he couldn’t handle being in a complicated, fussy homemade Halloween costume (and let’s be honest, what mom of a 13 month old wants to make one?), so I turned him into a little marathon runner.

We recreated this turn-key costume here with the help of Primary.com. You can get everything from hoodie sweatshirts, to racer-back tops, to athletic shorts in one shop. And all you need to DIY is the runner’s bib number (and remember…it’s so easy!).

This is the perfect costume for the parent that wants a clever costume with minimal rigging, and for the kid who just wants to take off and get her candy! On your mark, get set, GO trick-or-treating!

What you’ll need:

• Tyvek envelope
• Scissors
• Washi tape
• Adhesive vinyl letters
• Leggings
• Hoodie
• Primary Active running shorts, cherry
• Primary leggings, heather gray
• Primary Zip hoodie, cobalt
• Primary active racerback tank, white
• Primary Baby play short, tangerine
• Primary Baby leggings, heather gray
• Socks
• Safety pins

Make It:

1. Cut a rectangle from the Tyvek envelope that’s fits across your child’s stomach.
2. Add washi tape stripes on the top and bottom of the rectangles. (Safety  tip: florescent colors reflect  light for safety.
3. Adhere number stickers to the center of the number. Pin number onto shirt.

This post was sponsored by Primary.com.

This post was sponsored by Primary.com.

Making animal costumes is fun, but adding a silly or punny twist makes the whole thing that much better! So what’s better than a DIY pig costume? A DIY pig-in-a-blanket costume! Wrap your little piglet in a blanket that does double duty…it keeps your trick-or-treater warm on Halloween night and it provides great comic relief.

So instead of of just dressing up like a pig for this Halloween, take it one step further (just hold the mustard)!

What you’ll need:

• Primary Cozy Zip hoodie, in raspberry
• Primary yoga pant, in raspberry
• Primary Mittens, in raspberry
• Blanket
• Pink felt
• Pipe cleaner
• Hot glue gun
• Scissors
• Egg carton
• Pink paint
• Elastic
• Pink marker
• Template

1. To make the snout, cut a segment from the egg carton and paint it light pink. Let dry.
2. Draw two darker pink ovals on the front of the snout.
3. Hot glue a thin elastic cord on either side of the snout. 
4. To make the ears, download and print the template. Cut it out, trace it onto felt twice, and cut.
5. Fold the bottom corners to the center and hot glue. Flip it over, apply a line of hot glue along the bottom, and fold to secure.
6. Cut a piece of felt the length of a pipe cleaner, about 1” wide. Glue the pipe cleaner just off center. 
7. Fold the strip in half and hot glue closed. Cut the end to a point.
8. Twirl into a spiral and use a safety pin or hem tape to attach to the back of hoodie.

This post was sponsored by Primary.com.

This post was sponsored by our friends at Primary.com.

One of the winning qualities that I try to weave into Halloween costumes is to be able to use clothes after the holiday is over. It’s a challenge to craft this way, for sure, but it’s certainly economical and makes us feel less wasteful, both in regards to money and to materials!

This DIY Spelling Bee costume (see what I did there?) is exactly that. Nothing is permanently glued onto the clothes, which is a good thing because these Primary.com basics are the best! With yellow duct-tape stripes, elastic bumble bee wings, and antennae attached to a headband, you can pull off the “bee” elements and look chic and comfortable in your pullover hoodie and stripe leggings.

Now that spells FUN, right?

What you’ll need:

• Primary Pullover hoodie, in black
• Stripe legging, in black-ivory
• Yellow duct tape
• Scissors
• Hot glue gun
• Various blue papers
• 1” Letter and number stickers 
• Yellow and black pipe cleaners
• Yellow pom-poms
• Headband 
• 2 bubble envelopes
• Small rubber band 
• Pin back

Antennae

1. Twist a black and a yellow pipe cleaner together. 
2. Glue a yellow pom-pom to one end.
3. Twist the other end around the headband.

Award ribbon

1. Print template onto the back of your paper. Accordion fold on each line. 
2. Wrap a small hair or loom rubber band around the center of the folded paper. 
3. Hot glue the ends of each side of the folded paper together to make a circle.
4. Adhere a “1” to the center of the circle and glue to the center of the folded circle.
5. Cut two ribbon tails from blue paper.
6. Glue ribbon tails to the back and the pin back to the back center.

Sweatshirt

1. Adhere yellow duct tape in 2 to 3 stripes around the body and arms of the sweatshirt.
2. Use white letter stickers to write difficult words around the yellow stripes.

Wings

1. Cut bubble envelope on the two side seams. Repeat with the second envelope.
2. Trace wing template on each envelope.
3. Cut out each wing set.
4. Glue two wings together.
5. Cut elastic to fit around shoulders and glue loops to the wings.

This post was sponsored by our friends at Primary.com.

Slime. Will the rage ever go away? We LOVE slime at Project Kid, and when it comes to crafting for Halloween, it was so easy to make this cute monster house with a slime theme! Making monsters might be our favorite type of project because there are no rules. We are not trying to make our characters look like something that already exists, so let your kids be creative and use what you have in your craft drawer!

Start with a shoebox and go from there. Maybe your monster house has three stories? Remember…no rules, NO RULES!

1.Use double-stick tape to cover the inside of a small shoebox (approximately 6x9x3 in.) and a square gift box (approximately 3x3x3 in.) with craft paper. We used solid black on floors and ceilings and patterns on walls.

2. With a pencil, trace each box opening onto Astrobright vulcan green paper, and within the traced shape draw a wavy, drippy slime border, as shown. Cut out and glue around the open side of each box.

3. Add accessories to the room like art on the wall (framed in straws), a Lego table slimed with puffy paint (don’t worry; it peels right off!), or a pendant lamp made with a mini paper cup and a yellow bead for the lightbulb.

3 Ways to Make a Monster:

1.makeup blender + pipe cleaner + googly eyes

2. pom-pom + paper straws + googly eyes

3. kitchen sponge + felt

Photo by Dane Tashima, Styled by Pam Morris.

When designing Halloween crafts, sometimes you get sick of the old orange and black. This Day of the Dead, or Dia de los Muertos craft is the exception to that rule. This playhouse is made with just two pieces of cardboard slotted together, so the construction couldn’t be easier. Plus, if you want to put it away and save it for next year, it’s easy to flatten and store.

All of the little details are what make it super special from the spool tissue paper flowers to the sugar skull art on the wall! See below for how we made this for Parents Magazine.

1.Cut out two 12×16-in. pieces of cardboard. Then cut a long side of each rectangle into a house shape so that the sides are 10 in. tall and the center peak is 12 in. tall, as shown.

2. Paint the cardboard pieces on both sides in bright colors. Let dry.

3. Starting at the bottom of one piece, cut a 10-in. slit up the center. Then starting at the top of the other piece, cut a 2-in. slit down the center. (These pieces will slot together to form an X.)

4. Draw door shapes onto the walls and cut them out. (Optional: Leave one side of door attached, and bend it for a functioning door.)

5. Slide the two pieces of cardboard together to form the house.

6. Create a duct-tape border (optional). Along the top edges, adhere pieces of duct tape, sticky sides together, with about a 3/4-in. overhang. Trim the overhang into scallop shapes (it doesn’t need to be perfect!) and punch a hole in the center of each scallop. Then wrap a piece of duct tape around each vertical outside edge, as shown.

7. Add accessories to the rooms like sugar-skull art on the wall (made from paper and stickers), a cardstock-and-string garland, mini tissue-paper flowers, paper-straw candles, and a colorful felt rug.

Photo by Dane Tashima, Styled by Pam Morris.