A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing

Much as I admire the elaborate, complicated Halloween costumes on this site, I'm too busy and never organized enough to plan more than a few hours before trick or treating. I've already posted an instructable with general tips for the reluctant costume designer. This is a more detailed description of one last minute costume I threw together with scaps of cardboard and paper I had lying around.

I hope it will inspire you!

The shape for this mask is roughly a Gaussian "bell curve". As my son hurried to finish his homework, I cut out the rough shape with poster board and adjusted it for his head. This mask did NOT cover his face, it is more like a baseball hat with a giant rim -- which is much more comfortable to wear and perfect for the wolf's long nose.

After getting the shape and size correct for the head and nose, I cut out a pink poster board tongue and the lower jaw (I did all this freehand, I did not use a pattern -- but by looking at the photos you should be able to reproduce my mask).

I lined the board with some brown landscape fabric, a step I could have skipped if I'd had the correct color paper.

I made the teeth by rolling out regular printer paper into cones and stapling them to the jaw.

I stapled the lower jaw, with the tongue pre-attached, to both sides of the upper jaw, which formed and secured the curve of the jaw.

I used the black reverse side of the landscape fabric to fold a nose, which I stapled to the tip of the mask.

I cut out ears and eyes and stapled those on too (no time for glue!)

I used an eyelet to secure the gold rubber band (salvaged from a box of marzipan)....

...done! In less than 30 minutes...

The whole inspiration for this costume was a piece of sheepskin we have. I pinned that to my son's clothes, added a synthetic throw we had to give him more coverage, and this wolf in sheep's clothing was ready to go trick or treating.

At the last minute my older son decided he DID want to go after all -- but I wouldn't let him beg for candy without a costume. Luckily by combining my old jacket, his dad's sun hat and a stick with a duck tape hook he turned into a fairly convincing shepherd. Not the most loving, nurturing shepherd in the world, but I'll blame THAT on the sugar.

If you'd like to see other things I make, visit my website www.makepopupcards.com