Every October we have the same conversation at the counter, usually in the last week, usually with a parent holding a costume and doing the maths. The costume is lovely. The costume is also a thin shell designed by somebody who has never stood on a driveway in Alberta on the 31st of October.
Here is the good news: you almost never need a different costume. You need four small decisions, and if you make them this week instead of on the night, the whole evening is different.
Try the costume on over the coat — this week
This is the one that matters and the one nobody does.
A costume that fits beautifully in the shop, over a t-shirt, fits completely differently over the jacket your child will actually be wearing outside. Sleeves don't come down. Zips don't meet. A cape that hung nicely now sits halfway up their back.
So do the trial run now, with the real coat, in the house, when nobody is in a hurry. If it doesn't work you have ten days to size up, cut a seam, or rethink the layer underneath — instead of ten minutes and a child already in tears.
A note on sizing up: going one size bigger is usually the easy fix, and it rarely looks wrong. Costumes are forgiving that way. What is not forgiving is a costume that fits exactly, which means it fits over nothing.
Boots on the feet. Costume shoes in the bag.
The shoes that come with a costume have a lifespan of roughly eleven minutes outdoors.
After that they are in your hand, and so is the child. Put proper boots on, send the costume shoes to the class party in a bag, and accept that no photograph of a kid on a front step has ever been improved by the footwear. Nobody looks. Nobody has ever looked.
The layer that saves the look: a balaclava
The reason costumes get abandoned is almost always the head.
A hat flattens the wig, fights the hood and ruins the whole effect, so it comes off, and then the ears are cold and the evening is short. A balaclava solves it, because it goes underneath everything. Under a hood, under a witch hat, under a crown. It covers the ears and the neck and from two metres away it is invisible.
If your child has one from last year, find it now and check it still goes on. They grow out of these quietly.
A treat bag with a handle
This one sounds trivial until you watch it happen.
A child wearing mittens can hold a handle. A child wearing mittens cannot hold a pillowcase, a plastic cauldron with a wide rim, or anything that needs a grip. Within three houses the bag is being carried by an adult, and the mittens are off so they can carry it themselves, and now we are back to cold hands.
A bag with a real handle, or one that goes over a shoulder, keeps the mittens on. And bring a second pair of mittens. One pair always disappears somewhere around the third street.
Two more things, free
Put something that lights up in the bag — a little clip light, a glow stick, whatever is in the drawer. It gets dark earlier than you think, and it gives a kid something to be in charge of.
And pockets, or an adult with pockets. Candy is heavier than it looks.
Doing the trial run
The 31st falls on a Saturday this year, which is genuinely the easiest version: no school, no rush, and you can start while it is still light. Which also means there is no excuse for doing the costume fitting at five o'clock.
Do it this week. The forecast turns in a day or two, and a dress rehearsal in a warm house on a quiet evening is a completely different experience from one in a cold front hall with a clock running.
If you want a hand with it, bring the costume and the coat in and we will work it out on the floor with you. We have balaclavas, boots and bags with handles sitting on the counter this week for exactly this.
5112 Mullen Road, Edmonton. Monday to Friday 10–6, weekends 10–4:30. Free shipping across Canada on orders over $149.
