6 easy Halloween costume ideas based on favourite kids' books

This spooky season, encourage your little ones to dress up as their favourite book characters – what better way to subtly instill a love of reading, right?

Trick or treat!

Halloween is creeping up soon, and that means it’s time to start thinking about creepy costumes.

This spooky season, we’re encouraging little ones to dress up as their favourite book characters – what better way to subtly instill a love of reading, right?

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6 Easy Halloween Costumes

Bluey

Did you know that there have been over six million Bluey books sold in Australia? Wow! Everybody’s got Bluey fever this year.

Luckily, it couldn’t be easier for kids to hit the streets for trick or treating dressed as Bluey or Bingo Heeler. It’s as easy as wearing all-blue or all-orange and creating your own 3D paper mask, available to download and print here. 

Print it ready-to-go or choose the blank option to colour in and decorate the mask yourself.

While you’re at it, get kids in the spirit of Halloween with Bluey’s latest magnet activity book, Bluey: Let’s Get Spooky!

Image: supplied

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

Everyone’s favourite little caterpillar could never dream of being scary, but he sure is cute! Kids can dress as the Very Hungry Caterpillar by wearing all-green and downloading this Very Hungry Caterpillar mask. No need to colour in!

Read about his hunt for treats in The Very Hungry Caterpillar’s Halloween Trick or Treat.

Where is the Green Sheep?

A classic costume, perfect for your kiddo OR the whole family. If you’re coordinating costumes, we recommend going as a rainbow herd of sheep, with each family member and friend selecting a different colour.  Shotgun who gets to be the green one! To execute the costume, all you need to do is wear your selected colour and colour in the sheep mask from page 6 in this activity pack.

Alice-Miranda

Alice-Miranda is a lovely, strong character and has a flexible costume. Kids can choose their favourite outfit to replicate from any of the twenty book covers in the Alice-Miranda series and download this free Alice-Miranda mask on page 8 of this PDF. For once, kids won’t complain about wearing a school uniform!

Image: supplied

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

If your kid wants to dress up as something funny, you can’t go wrong with a costume inspired by the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. As an added bonus, this is a super low-maintenance costume for parents to execute. Win/win! To emulate Greg Heffley, all your child will need to do is don shorts and a t-shirt, finishing it all off with the Wimpy Kid mask from page 2 of this PDF.

The Witches

Want something a little bit scarier? Dress up as one of the witches from Roald Dahl’s The Witches. As the book explains, real witches wear regular clothes, so children can don any outfit suitable for a regular woman.

The difference between witches and ordinary women, however, is that witches wear wigs to conceal their bald heads and gloves to hide their claws. Adding a wig and gloves to a regular outfit will transform any outfit into a witch costume instantly.

Witches also follow the shoe trends of the times, even though pointy shoes hurt their block-shaped feet. For a bit of theatre, kids can occasionally hint at how much their feet hurt, stuffed into ‘ordinary shoes’.

Originally published as 6 easy Halloween costume ideas based on favourite kids' books