FLIPZLES

Almost every November 1st my family is already talking about what we want to dress up for Halloween as the next year. We have developed an extremely fun tradition of dressing up as a family that all of us look forward to and enjoy. My sister Teri's family also has this same tradition and this post is dedicated to showing where it all started and how the costumes have improved over the years.

The first time we ever "dressed up" as a family was in 2002 when Natasha was just 6 months old. When she was a baby we called her our little pea -- so of course we couldn't resist buying her this cute little baby pea costume. We decided to go to our ward Christmas party as "Pea Farmers."
It definitely wasn't anything fancy or exciting, but it is where our family costume tradition began.

2002 - Pea Farmers

The next few years were hit and miss. We were a young family on a pretty tight budget so we kept the costumes pretty simple or just used items we already had. In 2003 we used some of the clothes Jake had brought back from his mission in Mongolia to dress up with. In 2006 we dressed up as Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

In 2009 we went on a family trip to Disney World at the beginning of October so we let the kids pick out Disney characters they wanted to be and then Jake and I dressed as the villains. I borrowed the costume I wore and the kids costumes were all store-bought. Jake's was the only one we put together ourselves.

2009 Disney Characters with their Villains

In 2010 Dantley was born just 2 days before Halloween, so we went pretty simple. Thurston wanted to be Yoda so Jake kept up the villian theme from the year before and was a Sith. Tamsyn really really wanted to be a cat (like in real life turn into a cat)… so she was the black cat and Natasha was a witch.

2010 - I know I just had a babybut I'm a little dissappointed in myself for not at least attempting to dress up

In 2010 my sister Teri and her family started dressing up as a family and upped the ante.

Her family dressed as the Addams family and knocked it out of the park. She made the Cousin It costume out of yarn! She also figured out how to make the light bulb in Uncle Fester's mouth turn on and off.

Addams Family 2010

In 2011 Thurston really wanted to be Spiderman, so Jake dressed as Doc Ock. I was Cruella de Vil and the other kids were all dalmations.

Spiderman and Doc Ock 2011

Cruella and Dalmations 2011

Teri's family - Wizard of Oz 2011

Ghostbusters 2012

There was a ghost problem at Teri's and a copycat problem at our house :) Actually -- I think it is a great thing for amazing costumes to be used more than once… so since this was the same month I launched Flipzles and started my busy puzzle schedule I felt perfectly fine about not having quite as much work to do to get our family costumes together. Teri let me borrow the Cousin It, Wednesday and Uncle Fester costumes she had made and I put together a Pugsley costume for Dantley and a Morticia and Gomez costume for me and Jake. I included Pugsley's pet octopus Aristotle and Thing on Jake's shoulder.

Addam's Family 2012

Uncle Fester

Wednesday

Cousin It and Pugsley

Gomez and Morticia

We had high hopes for our costumes this year -- we thought Thurston was looking very much like the kid who plays James in James and the Giant Peach which inspired us to do James and the Giant Peach. He could be James and the rest of us could be the bugs. Although we were pretty happy with the costumes we were slightly disappointed with how few people actually knew who we were supposed to be. It is definitely more fun when people can tell what you are dressed up as instead of trying to explain it to everyone all night. These were all home made costumes using a lot of different things we reworked from thrift stores.

2013 James and the Giant Peach

James and Miss Spider

The Old-Green-Grasshopper and Ladybug

Glow-worm and the Peach along with Earthworm and Centipede arms (oh, and seagulls on his head)

2013 at Teri's house was once again pretty amazing. They did Hocus Pocus and rocked it. All the girls got the Sanderson Sister's expressions down and Teri recreated their costumes near perfection… she even made an amazing replica of the spell book.

Hocus Pocus 2013

Winifred and Sarah Sanderson

Mary Sanderson and Billy Butcherson

This particular photo of Teri's family keeps popping up in family costume idea lists.

In 2014 Thurston was once again our source of inspiration. His hair sometimes naturally comes to a widows peak in the center of his forehead so my dad calls him Eddie after Eddie Munster. We had so much fun as the Addams family that we figured we couldn't go wrong with the Munsters.

The Munsters 2014

Lily and Herman Munster

Eddie Munster and his toy werewolf

Grandpa

Scooby Doo and the Gang 2014

I must give my sister major props for making the awesome Mystery Machine!

In 2015 Halloween fell on a Saturday which meant that it was the perfect time for us to go to Denver and join my sister for a giant Halloween fun-filled weekend. My brother and his wife and even my mom also joined us for our theme this year.

2015 Disney Villians

Queen of Hearts

The Evil Queen

Maleficent

Syndrome

Scar

One of my favorite things about this costume is that Teri let me use the Cowardly Lion costume she had hand made a few years back. I added the black and white and claws to recreate it into Scar