So you’re thinking about going out for Halloween, but don’t know what to do because costume prices have gotten so expensive? 

According to the Halloween and Costume Association, costume expenses have been on the rise for many years now. This year, the cost has increased by $60, which is followed by a $40 increase from 2025, and a $20 increase from 2024. 

Although costumes have gotten more expensive, there is a way to save money this Halloween. You could find and make DIY costumes, instead of buying the entire costume from a Halloween store.

Here are seven costume ideas that you could make yourself. 

The Super Mario Brothers: 

If you and your friend want to dress up as Nintendo’s Super Mario Brothers, you only need a few things. If you are planning to be Mario, then you will need either a red short-sleeve or long-sleeve T-shirt, along with some denim overalls. For Luigi, you’ll need everything the Mario costume has. However, instead of red, wear green. 

Additionally, instead of regular overalls, you could wear short overalls. With the short overalls, you could wear a pair of thigh-high socks with red or green stripes at the top. 

After that, get some red and green hats. Either a newsboy or ball cap can be used. Then just print out a circular piece of paper with a red ‘M’ and a green ‘L’ in the middle of the paper. Finally, either pin, tape, or staple the paper to the hats. For shoes, you could wear black or brown sneakers or boots.

SpongeBob SquarePants: 

For a SpongeBob SquarePants costume, you will need a white short-sleeve button-up with a red tie, which you could probably find in your closet. Next, wear brown shorts with a black belt. You can swap out the shorts for a skirt. Finally, you can wear white tube socks with red and blue stripes with either black loafers or Mary Janes. Additionally, for the yellow of SpongeBob’s body, you can wear a yellow cardigan. 

For SpongeBob’s hat, you’ll need a white yacht-style sailor cap. This cap should come with the blue anchor that appears on SpongeBob’s hat. Next, you’ll need to either paint the brim of the cap blue. Or, you can glue some blue felt or fabric to the brim. Then, just above the brim, wrap either a black ribbon or fabric around the base of the hat. You can secure both elements with hot glue or fabric glue. 

To finish the costume, you can carry around a spatula that is mainly silver with a black handle. 

Karen Smith from “Mean Girls”: 

If you want to dress up as Karen Smith from “Mean Girls”, try her Halloween costume. 

You’ll need a black mini dress that is flowy at the bottom. The dress can be strapless or have spaghetti straps. Then you can take a pale pink ribbon, wrap it around your waist, and tie it into a bow. The bow should be on the front of the dress. Lastly, you’ll need gray mouse ears that have a pink in the middle. 

If you can’t find grey mouse ears with a pink middle, buy completely grey ones and add pink felt to the middle with hot glue. 

To finish the costume, you can wear black kitten slipper heels or regular black heels. Additionally, wear some long and sparkly earrings. 

Draculaura from “Monster High”: 

If your group is planning on dressing up as the main six from G1 “Monster High”, here is a DIY costume for Draculaura. 

For the upper half, you’ll need a white short-sleeve button-up, pink vest, and a mesh undershirt. Or you could get a pink corset and wear the mesh undershirt underneath. For both routes, you can wear a lace or ruffled collar around your neck. The lower half is just a white skirt. However, you could add a black tutu to resemble the black part of Draculaura’s skirt. 

For the rest of the main part of the costume, you’ll need some fishnets and pink knee-high lace-up boots. To make the boots look more like Draculaura’s boots, wrap some black ribbon from the back of the heel to around the ankle. Make sure to make an ‘X’ shape while wrapping the ribbon. 

Lastly, put your hair in low pigtails, along with either adding pink extensions or using colored hairspray for the pink stripes in Draculaura’s hair. 

Snoopy: 

Snoopy from the “Peanuts” is a pretty easy costume to DIY. 

All you’ll need is an oversized white sweater — or white corset —, a red scarf, a black skirt, black fishnets, white legwarmers, and black shoes. If you don’t want to wear a skirt, then you can swap it for black pants. Along with swapping the skirt, you can swap the legwarmers for white fur legwarmers. 

This last part is optional, but you can wear an aviator hat with aviator goggles along with the rest of the costume. 

Hello Kitty: 

Hello Kitty is another easy costume to DIY. You’ll only need four things for the entire costume. 

For the costume, you will need a short-sleeve red shirt, denim short overalls, red shoes, and a Hello Kitty bow headband. If you can’t find one, then you could get white cat ears and pair them with a red bow. Or you can put your hair up into half-up, half-down pigtails with a red bow on one of the pigtails.

Edited and Reviewed by Zoe Carter