Halloween Costumes from HalloweenCostumes.com {Review}

It's almost time for Halloween again! I love the holidays, and Halloween kicks off the season right, with kids dressing up like their favorite characters or in other creative outfits and trick or treating. It's been even more fun since Angelica was born, since we get to dress her up and take her out!

Angelica has been very particular about her Halloween costumes since she was two years old. She's been a pirate, Minnie Mouse, and a purple cat, and this year, she wanted to be a My Little Pony. Lucky for her (and me), I was given the opportunity to review halloween costumes from HalloweenCostumes.com, and they had a My Little Pony Halloween costume in her size!

As far as quality goes, this may be one of the best Halloween costumes we've ever owned! A lot of times, Halloween costumes will be made of flimsy material that gets torn the first time it's worn, so if you've got a lot of events to go to (or a particularly clumsy toddler), the costume won't hold up. That is NOT the case with this My Little Pony costume! It's really well made and comfortable, and exceptionally cute. I love the extra detail that went into this...the arm and leg warmers, the wings, the tail, and the "mask" that doesn't go over her face (so she can see where she's going -- safety first!) Angelica has worn this costume a few times already to play in and it's still in perfect shape.

As far as sizing goes, I think this may run a bit on the small side. We got the XS for Angelica, and she normally wears a 4T, and I think maybe I should have gone a size up because the skirt is a bit short. I expect it will be cold here in Boston on Halloween, though, so she'll be wearing tights and a long sleeved shirt with it, so it won't be a big deal.

This costume is $43.99 through HalloweenCostumes.com, which may seem a bit pricey, but since it seems durable, I think we'll get a lot of use out of it for dress up play after trick or treat time is over. HalloweenCostumes.com is also running a promotion right now where you can save $5 off of $50, $10 off of $75 and $15 off of $100, so if you're looking to buy costumes for the whole family, that could save you some money.

Disclaimer: I was provided a Halloween costume for review from HalloweenCostumes.com, and all content in this post is my opinion and has not been influenced by the receipt of the free product. A big thank you to the sponsor for supplying the review product!




By: Andrea Caruso

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Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everybody! We just wrapped up a SUPER fun weekend of Halloween festivities! I haven't finished going through ALL of the photos yet -- missing from this are a few snapshots of Angelica "helping" me carve her first pumpkin, and the trip we took to the pumpkin patch with Willy and Anna, but these photos are a start!

First, Angelica in her purple kitty costume, made by my mom. She's been talking about being a purple kitty for Halloween since MARCH! These were taken at our church's Halloween party. They really did a great job. We had a pot luck dinner, and the high school youth group did a fantastic haunted house -- which scared Angelica too much so Scott took her out. I went through though, with a couple of seven year olds who clung to me with fright and then ran screaming from the place after the last room.

At the end they did a "trick or treat", where each kid who was dressed up got to say their name, what they are, and then go through a line of people around the courtyard to get some treats. She got candy and toys, but she was most fascinated by a butterfly stamp that was in one of the treat bags. She was also very excited that her daddy got to be one of the candy givers!

Angelica, the purple kitty.

Acting like a cat :)

A ghost statue, just her size. She kept hugging and kissing it.

This is Katye, one of the girls who works in the church nursery. Angelica <3s her!

Anyway, here's some pictures of Angelica having fun at the church party!

This second set is from our friends Julie and Scott's Halloween party. Their little boy, Jake, who is just as cute as can be, has been in the nursery with Angelica at church for the past year or so. Angelica decided to break out the princess costume for this party (though she will be trick or treating as the purple kitty.

Pushing a baby monkey (Eli) in the swing

Swinging princess!

Baseball princess!

Showing her boyfriend Aidan how to mow the lawn.

More baseball princess.

Tonight we'll be trick or treating with Willy and Anna! I should have more photos of that tomorrow. Have a safe and happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween!

I hope everyone had a fantastic Halloween! Angelica was Minnie Mouse this year, and it was really the first year that she understood and enjoyed the concept of Trick or Treating. Last year she was able to parrot the phrase "Trick or Treat" (though it sounded more like "cheetochee!" when she said it) but this year she said it at every single house, and thanked every single person for the candy.

A few houses down from ours is where the VPK teacher for her daycare lives, and they went ALL OUT for decorations...unfortunately that meant that as soon as we got close enough to the house to trigger the sound effects, Angelica burst into squeals and shrieks and cried her little heart out. So we didn't get to show off her costume to the teacher. Oh well. It was the only "fail" of the night...all of the other houses were pretty tame!

In the end she got a huge haul of candy, which you'll see below...and in typical bad mom fashion, I let her, for one night only, eat as much of it as she wanted...so she proceeded to open a bunch of candies, take one bite, and then move on to the next. She probably only got ten bites of candy total...nevertheless, the sugar crash she had later was priceless. In more ways than one.

A blog post about Halloween wouldn't be complete without a few pictures from the day! Just an FYI before you see these, she was TOTALLY against having her picture taken and was not happy about having to wait for me to take pictures before we left. I think they came out pretty good in spite of that, though!

Miss Crankyminnie not wanting to get her picture taken...

She's better now!

Our First Trick or Treat!

Hope everyone had a safe and happy Halloween!

This year was the first year Angelica was "eligible" to go trick or treating. Last year on Halloween, she was only five months old, so we dressed her up in a cute outfit and took a couple of pictures, but we didn't go trick or treating.

[caption id="attachment_304" align="aligncenter" width="214" caption="Angelica on Halloween 2008"][/caption]

So, this year was a lot different! Halloween is probably my favorite holiday each year (though Christmas is a close second...I go back and forth on this every year), and both Scott and I were very excited to get Angelica dressed up and take her trick or treating. We had decided months ago that she would be a pirate...we were originally going to do a whole "pirate family" theme, but then decided to just focus on her.

We got her dressed up in her costume after her afternoon nap, and then let her run around and play in it. She really enjoyed it! We didn't really have any trouble getting her to wear it, and after she had it on, she really tried to act out the part.

In the days leading up to Halloween, we practiced saying "Trick or Treat" with her, and she picked it up pretty quickly! In fact, at one house she walked up to the door, pounded on it saying "knock knock knock!" and then when the man at the house answered, she said "cheetochee!" (which is how it came out when she tried to say "trick or treat"). I need to invest in a camcorder to capture moments like these.

Here's a couple of pre-Trick or Treat shots I took of her.
[caption id="attachment_309" align="aligncenter" width="214" caption="Angelica Halloween 2009"][/caption]




To make the day even more fun, we went trick or treating with my sister's family. Her son/my nephew is almost three, and her daughter/my niece is two months younger than Angelica. My nephew was the cutest firefighter you've ever seen, and my niece was the prettiest little princess. What a great bunch of kids they were (except, in the picture below, Angelica did not want to sit still...she had to be pulled away from the candy bowl in order to snap this very candid shot!)


Minutes after this shot was taken, five adults (my parents joined us) and three children, all under the age of three, began what was a very short journey around the neighborhood. We didn't get much candy (thank goodness) but had an abundance of fun.

(By the way, if you like these pictures and live in the Central Florida area, be sure to check out my photography site!)

Angelica's First Halloween!

As you can see here, Angelica enjoys Halloween today much more than she enjoyed the pumpkin patch yesterday. Look at this little smiling cutie! She's even been so kind today to take a nap long enough for me to practice some of my new photoshop skills.

Yes, that's right. We are going on hour 3 of her nap now. The sleep schedule keeps going back and forth, and I don't get it! For three nights in a row, she slept like a charm. Then last night she got up twice again. Now she's in the middle of a 3 hour nap? Makes no sense! But I am glad she's sleeping. Maybe she's going through a growth spurt.

Anyway...speaking of Halloween, it's our biggest Trick or Treating yet! We've had four...yes, FOUR Trick-or-Treaters today...a princess, a bumblebee, a pumpkin, and some teenager on a bike just cruising around asking for candy. (He was kinda stinky and didn't even have a candy bag with him.) These are our first trick or treaters since 2004, and that year we only got one. I'm glad I picked up a small bag of candy at Target today!

Happy Halloween everyone! Hopefully my little punkin' will wake up soon!

Angelica goes to the pumpkin patch

Cute, right? I would have loved to get more good photos of her with the pumpkins, because I was so looking forward to it...but she wasn't having it. She was in just about the worst mood I've ever seen her in.





But at least I got a couple of cute photos...including some of me and her. Like this one!





And then there is the most ironic photo ever...notice the "Happy Harvest" sign and the very notably unhappy baby. Oh well. It's still cute, and gives me something to show her friends when she's 16.