I love Halloween, it’s pretty much favorite holiday. Halloween has definitely become more fun once Pumpkin started getting into it too. For Halloween 2017, he wanted to be an astronaut. So, like any good millennial mom I trawled around Pinterest to find something special. The final costume consisted of three distinct parts: the helmet, the suit and the jet pack.

The Helmet

The helmet was the most difficult part. I was never super keen on paper maché as a kid, but figured maybe now it would be fun and different? Heh. I mostly drew from this wonderful tutorial on creating a paper maché space helmet with the assistance of a balloon. For the paper maché mixture, I used straight up PVA craft glue and water. I did not take many pictures of this process, but here we go:

1. Inflate balloon – ideally, you would measure the head of the helmet the balloon was made for and add maybe 3-5 inches to the diameter of the ballon before beginning. I did not do this and grossly over-estimated the size of the helmets.
2. Rip up paper – a friend of mine who makes and sells piñatas does not recommend newspaper but rather brown craft paper! I used newspaper for our helmets.
3. Mix about half and half glue and water – your mileage may vary.
4. Place balloon in a pot or some such thing to stabilise it, dip paper in glue mix, run paper between two fingers to remove excess and smooth onto the balloon. Repeat until balloon is covered, except for the part at the bottom.
5. Ideally, you would wait for the balloons to completely dry and repeat step four numerous times. I did not allow for enough drying time before Halloween and only really was able to do three rounds on the balloons. Mine were somewhat sturdy, but a lot more flexible than I had wanted. The harder you want your helmet, the more rounds of paper maché you should do, which means waiting for it to totally dry. We live in the UK, so this means a very long time. If I were to try this again, I would go for at least five rounds of paper mache – possibly six or seven, this time using craft paper instead of newspaper.
6. Paint helmet – I used white acrylic paint. I am not a paint expert, I just stood in Hobbycraft for a long time trying to decide which paint would do the job for the best price. It worked pretty well!
7. When the paint dries, pop balloon, gently pull out the rubber. You should have an exposed balloon at the bottom to make this part easy.
8. Using your human, measure out a rectangular space where their face will go. I would recommend making this rectangle long horizontally with the short, vertical ends slightly curved outward for the best fit. Cut paper maché out along this outline.
9. Using black duct (or Duck) tape, tape around edges at bottom of helmet and the open window. The tutorial linked above has lots of nifty ideas about screens and LED lights on the inside and painting the inside of the helmet, but I was a procrastinator and skipped that part. You could also consider painting NASA (or Rogue NASA) logos on your helmet too.

A couple tips looking back: If this is your chosen costume, start early, like before the first of October. The climate in the UK is so humid that it takes things an excruciatingly long time to dry! Pumpkin’s helmet turned out pretty good, and it is still lurking around his closet for playtime a year later, but it could have been better if I had started earlier. I do recommend using a heavier paper than newspaper in retrospect also.

The Space Suit

Luckily, the suit was not as difficult as the helmet and came together rather quickly. I used this tutorial to create his suit out of old sweatpants and an old hoodie. For an average sized four year old, I think I went through about one roll of silver Duck tape and four to five rolls of white? It is difficult to say, because I tried to make an adult size version as well.

1. Flatten out the hoodie – I started with the inside of the hood. From the neck, I placed strips of silver tape running vertical to the head part. You have to be a bit careful not to let the fabric bunch and the hoodie is a good place to start to get the hang of this.
2. Using the white Duck tape, repeat this process on the outside of the hood.
3. Next, flip the hoodie over and from the bottom center to the neckline, place strips of white Duck tape until the entire back to the sleeves is covered. Repeat this process on the front.
4. The arms are a little tricky, from the wrist to the shoulder, I placed vertical strips of white Duck tape along each arm, and below the arm from the hem of the sweat shirt to the arm pit.
5. Outline the wrists with silver Duck tape (black works here also) and around the bottom hem. I also used a little piece of silver to make him a name-tag. For a bit of contrast, I lined the hoodie edges with black.
6. Lay the trousers flat, and repeat the process. For the center/crotch area, I just used a couple shorter strips – one for the front, one for the back, and one for the crotch.  I left the waistband free of tape so it would not irritate Pumpkin’s tummy, and also the hoodie was long enough that it covered it anyway. Use silver/black trim for the ankles, or just find some boots and use those. Pumpkin’s favorite red wellies worked perfect.

A couple tips – luckily this part did not take as long. The trickiest part was probably along the zipper – you have to really line up the tape just right. I tried to make an adult-sized version; however, I learned that you should always use a size bigger than what you normally wear because it is inevitable that the Duck tape process will make things shrink quite a bit. I could not get the pants on when I finished! Luckily, my hoodie worked out ok, and what really matters in the end is that Pumpkin looked fantastic. Also, Duck tape makes all sorts of fun coloured and patterned tapes! It is now my go-to tape for everything.

The jet pack

The jet pack was also quite easy to make and used a lot of recyclables, perhaps what the British call “junk modelling.” I was inspired by this tutorial. I used some thick black elastic, a small cardboard box, two two-litre empty soda bottles, glue, red, yellow and orange felt, silver Duck tape, and silver spray paint.

1. Using your silver Duck tape, tape soda bottles to cardboard box so they are side by side longways. A glue gun might work instead of Duck tape, but the PVC glue I used for the paper maché did not work and I had some left over.
2. Spray box-bottle thing with silver spray paint and wait for it to dry.
3. Cut out felt into flames – can be messy and abstract!
4. Using that Duck tape, stick felt pieces to the openings of the soda bottles.
5. Find your human, measure out elastic and tape (or glue) to back of the cardboard box so the whole thing can fit on their back like a rucksack/backpack.

Again, this one was pretty easy to assemble and thankfully used things that we had lying around our flat.

Space...and Beyond!

Last, but not least, my partner did want to be left out. I bought him a black hoodie and matching sweat pants and got some planet and star wall stickers. Costume sorted!

One of the best parts about this costume is that it will keep your kids warm if it’s chilly out for trick or treating and Halloween parties.

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and found some outer-wordly inspiration for future Halloweens! Enjoy what I like to call the most wonderful time of the year!