Baby Halloween Costumes

Less than a week until Halloween! If you've been following my posts for any time now, you'll know that I love cosplaying. If you've been following my posts recently, you'll know my wife is pregnant (30 weeks along today!). So naturally I've been thinking about Halloween 2020 when I'll have an 11-month old baby to dress up. Never mind the fact that we'll get to take her trick-or-treating and eat all her candy, I'm just excited to show her off and dress up with her. So for any other expecting parents (or new parents) here are some ideas I found on Pinterest.

Doctor Who
Depending on which Doctor you're talking about or which companion, this could be really simple. A baby dressed as the Eleventh Doctor is just perfection in my eyes. Sure, you won't have the tweed jacket, but my heart just melts whenever I see a little boy at church with suspenders and/or a bow tie. You could do the same thing with a tie and 3D glasses for the Tenth Doctor. If that's too much for your baby, you could also do a onesie with some dots and a Dalek hat. Suddenly you have a baby Dalek.

Harry Potter
This mandrake cosplay is pretty simple. Get a lightweight pot. Depending on the baby you could either do a brown onesie or no onesie. After that you just need a dark hat with a couple leaves taped to it. If you don't want to do that, there's an easy 5-pack Harry Potter onesie set on Amazon. Two of them could be easy costumes, either as a Gryffindor student or a Gryffindor Quidditch player. Add some tiny glasses and you've got a mini Potter.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07LC31V16/ref=cm_sw_r_em_api_i_c_ZaXSDbP9HHSJC

Super Heroes
With the MCU being so big right now (and only getting bigger with Disney+) it's really easy to do Marvel costumes right now. You can get a romper, like in these pictures from Pinterest. Or if you want to go really low maintenance, Amazon has another set of onesies with Avengers outfits. That'll give you four easy cosplays for $30. Also, you could do the same thing with some DC heroes. It's pretty easy to get a Superman or Batman onesie.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06Y24HBVK/ref=cm_sw_r_em_api_i_c_qeXSDbQDVRYEZ

Star Wars
I've seen plenty of DIY Ewok costumes on Pinterest with just a teddy bear costume and brown shirt. If you want to go really easy though, look for a onesie again. Chewbacca or Darth Vader are pretty easy to find if you start looking. I found them for $28 at this link.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07Q876NH2/ref=cm_sw_r_em_api_i_c_KDXSDb87M8SED

Disney Characters
Disney does a good job marketing their costumes. I'm just waiting for November 1 for Disney Store to start putting all their Princess costumes on clearance. Having a baby Ariel or Jasmine to go with my Eric or Aladdin costume would be just living the dream. However, if you can't find a good Disney costume on clearance, we always have the option again of onesies from Amazon. If you've got a little girl, you can easy get a 5-pack of Disney Princess onesies, giving you the option of Aurora, Snow White, Ariel, Cinderella, or Belle. For options for boys, you could get a Pixar pack with options for Mike Wazowski, Nemo, Buzz Lightyear, or Mr Incredible/Dash/Jack Jack (that one could also be Violet or Elastigirl for a girl too).
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07K38G8Y6/ref=cm_sw_r_em_api_i_c_uYXSDbZBP0E0V
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07KRMB5CN/ref=cm_sw_r_em_api_i_c_XXXSDbARVXRHQ

Bottom line: if you want to go super low maintenance, you can pretty much find a onesie for any fandom you want if you look with the right words on Amazon. (Wish me luck convincing my wife on a fun family costume for next year, I'm thinking Disney).

Endgame Wisdom from Frigga

“Everyone fails at who they're supposed to be, Thor. The measure of a person, of a hero, is how well they succeed at being who they are.” --Frigga (Avengers: Endgame)

Last week my wife had her baby shower (only 11 weeks to go now!) and so while she was out I had a few friends over and we watched “Endgame”. It was the first time I’d seen it since theaters, so in some ways it was like watching it brand new all over again. As such, this line from Frigga struck me.

In a world that praises “authenticity” we get so many messages about who we’re supposed to be. These can be as “superficial” as how we’re supposed to look or how we’re supposed to act, but it also extends to how we live the commandments. Too often the world of “authenticity” tells us we’re supposed to live on our impulses, breaking the commandments. The law of chastity and the word of wisdom are two that particular get put under scrutiny. To live as the natural man too often gets equated with living authentically.

However, that’s not who we are. Never mind that we are instructed to “[put] off the off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ” (Mosiah 3:19) but the natural man isn’t even who we are to begin with. Since the beginning, we are the children of God. Those of us who grew up in the church have sung about it basically since birth. It was also reiterated just a couple weeks ago in General Conference with the revised Young Women’s motto.

“I am a beloved [child] of heavenly parents, with a divine nature and eternal destiny.”

As much as we “are” who we’re supposed to be in the world, we’ll never live up to our eternal potential if we stay that way. As Frigga said, the measure of ourselves is how we succeed at who we are, children of God. Of course we’ll stumble along the way. But that’s okay. There’s always a way back to Him and to reach our divine potential.

“God knows that you are not perfect, that you will fail at times. God loves you no less when you struggle than when you triumph.” -- Elder Uchtdorf (General Conference Oct 2019)