We need your costume ideas for World Book Day

'Eloise', would be fairly easy, a black skirt with straps stitched to it like braces, white blouse, unbrushed hair, and a fake tortoise on a string.

I am a secondary teacher and my daughters are in secondary school too now. I really miss WBD! Occasionally I dress up as a character for school but I loved making costumes with the girls too.

In the past they have been things like:

• Elmer
• Rapunzel (massive trail of plaited wool attached to a princess crown)
• Medussa
• The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe (all at once!)
• The White Witch
• Red Riding Hood AND the wolf - red riding hood gear plus wolf hands and tail
• The Mirror from Snow White
• Dobby the house elf and Fawkes the phoenix from Harry Potter

Easy things include -
Milly Molly Mandy
Pippi Long Stockings
Miss Muffet and the spider
Alice
Jack and/or Jill
The White Rabbit

Someone from The Cautionary tales could be fun too.

memoo, why not There's a House Inside My Mummy? if you have a stripy top, wear that and put a picture of a house on your tummy!!

sorry if inappropriate - just hope to reduce the stress around this event which IMO tends to slide away from any emphasis on reading/books to the costumes...

I'm a primary school teacher and last year we had about a hundred Troys, Gabriellas and Harry Potters. The kids have to stand up in assembly, announce their character and the book that they're from, which is always entertaining!
Would recommend pairing up with a friend as Tweedledum/dee or Alice in Wonderland: blue frock and Alice band. Noddy: blue shorts, red shirt, nightcap. Cinderella: party dress/rags. The Ugly Sisters: Crazy mixed up clothes and a painted on beauty spot. Or if all else fails then wearing own clothes and going as one of the Famous Five is always a good cop out!

spare a thought for school teaching staff like me! I'm a reception TA and I have to dress up too!

I hate it and have no idea what to wear as I am pregnant and nothing fits me

lol @ David

Last year my dd went as Tabitha Twitchett from Tom Kitten, we found a frilly apron and tied it over an old princess and the pauper pink dress, black tights for tail, painted on paws/whiskers, made cat ears and she carried 'Tom' with a hairbrush which she kept brushing him with, lol.

This yr she wants to go as Gabriella from HSM. Tried to tell her this is not strictly book based, but she got her HSM annual to prove it. lol.

School a friend of mine worked in got the teachers to dress up as a character from their favourite book.
She asked me to guess which character the somewhat solemn male teacher was. He was dressed in : Shorts,shirt, sandals and had a catapult.

Where's Wally?-no
Just William-no
Eh, someone fron The Famous Five?-nope

David as in David and Goliath from The Bible!

I saw one or read about one a while ago it was the Pied Piper: Normal trousers and a shirt, carry a tin whistle (or recorder) get some plastic rats - tie them to a pieces of string, then tie the strings to a belt. you could add a hat too if you had one (to the child not the rats )

My favourite for girls(because it is easy) is Red Riding Hood,
I made a simply red cloak, dress or skirt and blouse underneath, a little basket with some cakes or cookies (real or plastic)

Fantastic mr fox, rubber chicken, fun fur fox tabard( ebay) empty milk thing marked " cider"

Marne My DD went as Biff. Dead easy normal clothes then we made a big shiny magic key which she carried with her

DS is mad on firefighters so is going in a Fireman's uniform. We have a few books on the subject, both fiction and non-fiction. School have been doing a push on non-fiction so it's quite nice to dress up as something from one of them (especially useful for boys).

The cat in the hat is nice and easy! Black clothes, red and white stripey hat made from cardboard a tail made from an old pair of black tights, stuff one leg with anything you can find, socks, tissue paper, whatever, then tie the other leg around waist to hold tail in place. Use an eyeliner pencil to draw on a nose and whiskers. xx

DS2 and DS3 are nearly always James Bond. It's dead easy if you have a jacket and they already have black trousers - I've made bow ties in the past but recently broke down and bought some.

Oh am I glad to see this thread. Last year I excelled myself with a Captain Hook outfit for my DD - I made a really good pirate hat and cutlass, and a jacket of mine was just right with some gold braid added as a frock coat, with an old white blouse belted underneath.

She was going to wear it again this year, until the notice came home saying they had to come as a 'goodie' . I can't think of anything suitable for a 10 year old girl that actually looks distinctively like a goodie in a book, which is also within my powers of creation [no, I can't make an Aslan costume]. The only 'dressing up' outfit that still fits her is a witch outfit.

I also thought about Prince Charming

I was thinking of sending my DS as Mr Bump (quite apt for him) - don't really rate the Mr Men books but thought the costume would be easy! Lots of bandages/plasters etc. Might draw the line at painting him blue though.

Dd'1 has to dress up on the 6th of March, she's in reception (our first time dressing up for book week), i havn't got a clue what to dress her in, i have a feeling she will ask to go as Biff or Kipper . Asda have Mr men and Little Miss costumes.

I once sent ds2 in shorts and a shirt, blue wellies and carrying all the Winnie-the-Pooh characters and a big blue umbrella.

The same year, my best friend put her ds in a 'Where's Wally' costume she made - which went down a storm. There were a lot of Harry Potters in the playground that day too. It is a nice easy one to do - school uniform and a cape, plus scar on forehead.

Oh and also, they had a book shop open in the library for the whole week and guess what they were selling? Football annuals!!!!

Reading is reading!

I know choosy - alot of the Mum's are fed up about it. In general, the boys are not that interested in dressing up, they feel self conscious and embarassed. What annoyed them most is that alot of the girls went in a shop bought fairy/princess dress with reference to no fairy/princess book in particular and this was ok with the school.

I think WBD was invented by some group of evil education types to torture parents and their children!!!!

My DD is in reception and going as Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland - got princess dress and cut out lots of hearts to pin on and made a crown - she's done most of it herself

I'm outraged at the anti-football-kit measure. Asking to bring in the book is fair enough, but if they really enjoy reading their football annual (and who's to say that they don't) then that should deffo be spun as a good thing, and they should be asked to read something they enjoyed from it.

Isn't it supposed to be about reading, not about scouring the poor parents' brains for costumes?

ds1 hasdecided to o as Dracula with a pretty standard cobbled together vampire outfit

ds2 iswearing some nasty briht green trousers I bought fromEbay for a reason I will neer know (!), orange shirt, orange face paint and green curl;y wig as an Oompa Loompa

Ours is a week late though to allow for the Eisteddfodd celebrations

In my DDs class, the year before last, about 90% of the boys wore football kits. The next year the letter said "please bring the book so we can see your character" - it backfired as they all brought in their football annuals and still wore their kits!!! This year the letter says no football kits please!!!!!

DS nursery are doing it and he wants to be Jack from Jack and the beanstalk, his name is Jack so he thinks he can just wear his own clothes!!! I don't think he's got the hang of the whole dressing up lark!!!