To think World Buy an expensive costume Day & it's costume buying aren't cricket

[3Daddy31982]

I don't like world buy an overpriced cosumeday. Not every family can afford £19?
Aibu?

DS 16 is going into his 6th form wearing his VERY well worn Jurassic Park T-shirt.

No extra expense incurred.

Thank you Michael Crichton!

There is no way I would spend £19 on a costume and I don’t see why you think you need to. I think it is the competitive costuming by parents that is the issue not the dressing up in itself. I did once buy a Camp Half Blood T shirt for about £7, but as PP says you could just write it on a T- shirt, and I also once bought a bit of fun fur and cut two holes in it for a Viking waistcoat.
There are so many book characters who are just normal children. Most of the Roald Dahl characters for a start. Just add a prop to show who they are - golden ticket, medicine bottle.

For the posters who say anything can just be thrown together for a low cost, I just can't see how families in poverty, going to food banks etc can participate. Even if they go in just PJs (in winter 🥶) as some character or other, it's going to look bloody obvious the next year in the same PJs! Not to mention, children living in poverty tend to have less access to books (yes, libraries but there are still barriers). I just think it's a bad idea, enough children are below the poverty line that it's not going to be an extremely rare issue either.

I just can't see how families in poverty, going to food banks etc can participate

They could borrow something. Put out a message on the class WhatsApp or SM and someone like myself would be happy to help. I can do Cat in Hat, a pirate character, a fireman character, gangster granny, Cruella de ville and no doubt many others.

@Divebar2021

I just can't see how families in poverty, going to food banks etc can participate

They could borrow something. Put out a message on the class WhatsApp or SM and someone like myself would be happy to help. I can do Cat in Hat, a pirate character, a fireman character, gangster granny, Cruella de ville and no doubt many others.

I don't want to be argumentative but surely that would feel quite humiliating for some people?

I don't want to be argumentative but surely that would feel quite humiliating for some people?

Well, I don’t want to speak for anyone else but it would be a pretty normal request among my DDs school parents. I’ve just had a conversation with another parent actually about lending her something. It doesn’t mean I think she’s poor or that I make any other type of judgement.

It is really hard because kids will say “I want to dress up as X” and it’s not a costume you can easily make. My 4yo wanted to be a dinosaur like Dinosaur Roar and he was crying when I said he had to wear his Halloween costume and be Dracula. So I’ve ended up buying a dinosaur and hopefully he can wear it at least twice and I can sell it later on.

I forgot. It’s the first one. We just routed round DS’s bookshelf and we’re going with the Dinosaur that pooped the planet. No customer - just a toy dinosaur.

Definitely doesn’t need to cost the world (though I think much better prep is key for good costumes that cost very little).

@TheBareTree

I agree OP.

Our school also gave us 6 days notice that children had to make a ‘book in a box’. Anyone else had to do this? If you don’t know what it is, Google it for pictures. It’s basically homework for parents 🙄

I was just saying about the “homework for parents” thing about the book in a box to my friend, we were joking that since it’s so clearly for the parents to do 99% of the work, maybe we should do a “The Metamorphosis” or “The Brothers Karamazov” book box. (We didn’t really, obviously)

As for dressing up, DS is going as Mr Bump. Blue clothes and bandages wrapped around him, sorted.

I agree @Divebar2021 . I wouldn't assume someone wanted to borrow something because they were "too poor" to buy it, I would assume they were asking to borrow because it makes no sense whatsoever to buy something to wear once.

I've borrowed things for my dc (not just World Book Day, but different activities over the years) and I have lent people things. I have also borrowed the odd thing for myself when it is for an occasion I only am going to need the thing once. Perfectly normal, sensible thing to do in my book, and nothing to do with having the money or not.

@Obira - but dc say "I want....." all the time. That is part of parenting, how you manage expectations. It isn't a reason to not have dc dressing up for WBD.

I don't think you need to buy one surely? DS went as couple of things but one of his favourites was as Bilbo Baggins. We got a stick from the garden and he wore his dads wedding ring on a chain round his neck. Then wore his own clothes and a backpack.

Sherlock Holmes he went with just a magnifying glass and a hat we already had.

We just use what we have at home and try and tie it into an existing book they own! This year my dd is dressing as Sophie from The Tiger Who Came to Tea. Easy.

Old white sheet - she's a ghost
Black leggings, tucked in black t-shirt and black hoodie with two black shield like cardboard sit outs. - she's a crow (Ted hughes fan here)

Cost next to nuffink - benefit - priceless

I normally try to invent one out of a dressing-up item we already have or some other kind of clothing - eg. last time DD was Sophie from the BFG in a nightie and dressing-gown, plus we made a dream jar out of a plastic kitchen pasta jar with a string of cheap LED lights in it. Job done!

Another year DD wore an old blue gingham school summer dress with ankle socks and hair in two plaids with red ribbons and a toy dog in a basket = Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz.

This year DD was all set to go as Hermione Granger - fantastic, thought I: she can just go in her usual school uniform with a £3 Gryffindor tie from eBay. Sorted! Except school decided that this year, instead of a costume, they all had to buy and decorate plain t-shirts with scenes from their favourite book! This actually proved way more difficult and annoying to do and what school clearly thought was money saving for parents has turned out not to be at all. Argh.

Thank god my dcs school never did this shit. I had 4 dc and it would have been an expensive nightmare. Is there any evidence whatsoever that dressing up one day a year makes kids read more? Hmm, thought not

So at the last minute, ds decided on Harry and his bucket of dinosaurs. Fantastic.

We had a bucket in the garage, we have dinosaurs. Sorted.

Dd wanted to go as Victoria Stitch but accepted that we couldn’t make/buy the costume. She managed to find the right props to go with her costume, and I did her face paint. She was so happy. Might not have the right costume but she has the face and props. Sorted

The majority of characters in children's books are not 'dressed up', so you could easily be a character without any special costume.

It's not world book day that's the problem - the day itself is about making sure that children everywhere have access to books. It's the way people have ruined it by buying into the marketing hype.

It's absolute bullshit. Disney and the supermarkets are laughing at us. Just read ffs!

Kids enjoy it and it encourages reading, appreciation of books.

You don’t have to buy a costume; make one out of some old clothes or a sheet or cardboard or borrow one. There are loads of ideas online for making a costume without spending money!

@WheekestLink

My daughter doesn't like fancy dress and is going in her school uniform (her choice, although I did tell her she could wear whatever she wants that day). She gets really unsettled by change, so no pressure from the school or from us on her.

My son was the same.

He used to go as from my diary

Some people have no imagination these days. When I was a kid, the typical standard Halloween outfits were: a bin bag over your clothes and a hat you made yourself out of cardboard: witch; and an old sheet with eye holes cut out: ghost.

There are hundreds of book characters that wear normal clothes. The kid just needs to style their hair a certain way. Or an animal: wear the appropriate-coloured clothes and a homemade mask.

After a certain age children are old enough to make their own masks, tails etc. and come up with their own ideas anyway.

My dcs refused to dress up in a homemade costume because it has to be shop bought and 'cool' or everyone will laugh at them, apparently. School only told us on Friday what they would be dressing up as (it changes every year) so I had no opportunity to buy second hand and had to spend £5 on next day delivery so it would get here in time. Youngest dc is dressed as a character from a film he has never watched because it was the only costume he was willing to wear. He is normally in floods of tears about going to school as it is, so I didn't want to cause even more aggro by making him wear something he wasn't comfortable in. I spent £40 altogether and, if I'm honest, I couldn't really afford it.

I'm trying to decide whether to ask the school if the focus can be brought back to the books, with it just being a non uniform day where everyone brings in a favourite book, but I don't know if it's just my kids who are feeling the peer pressure to dress a certain way. Other option is just to tell my DCs that next year they won't be dressing up as I can't afford it.

I can imagine it would feel humiliating to lots of parents to have to ask others for help with costumes for their kids. It's different when you're reasonably well off and could afford to buy costumes if you wanted, but there can be a lot of shame around not being able to provide for your kids (even if the thing you can't provide is only a stupid synthetic costume from a supermarket) and you worry about how your kids will feel having to wear their wealthier classmates' cast-offs.

One of mine hated dressing
He wore his own clothes and most years went as a secret agent/spy, one year as a dad and another as brother.

Our school also gave us 6 days notice that children had to make a ‘book in a box’. Anyone else had to do this? If you don’t know what it is, Google it for pictures. It’s basically homework for parents

Why do parents do their kid's homework for them? If your kids don't enjoy that sort of thing or aren't much good at it, they'll just bring something in that's not that great. So what? If they're embarrassed or get in trouble for their poor efforts then maybe it will encourage them to try harder next time... or maybe it won't. Up to them.