McLean County Mom Makes Epic Halloween Costumes For Her Son

My favorite part of Halloween isn't the candy. Although the race is tight, it isn't even the decorations. Hands down, what I love more than anything else are the costumes. It's so much fun to see kids of all ages have fun dressing up and sometimes even getting into character!

There are some really nice store-bought costumes out there these days, but the ones that always "win Halloween," in my opinion, are the handmade masterpieces.  My mama used to make mine every year, so they bring back nostalgic memories galore. Up until this year, I always made some component of my son's costumes. This year, he's helping me.

That's why when I saw an absolutely amazing costume at Treats on the Tarmac the other night, I wanted to share it with you all. To show you something SUPER cool and feature a very special creative mama who KILLS IT for her baby boy every year.

Chrissy McPherson-Lee from McLean County makes her son Deegan's costumes for a couple of reasons. First, he wears glasses. When he wants to dress up as a masked character, that can be tricky. It isn't fun to have your glasses smashed on your face, plus that makes it hard to see. If you know, you know.

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Second, he loves old movies. The characters he wants to dress up as haven't been your typical costume store costumes. Jim Carrey's The Mask

The Predator! This one is soooooo cool. It only cost about $10, but it took Chrissy six months to make all of the pieces.

"Predator was made out of cardboard, so much paper mache I lost count of the nights I did it, backer rod that I melted over the stove and rolled out by hand to make the points on the dreads, old belts to hold all the cardboard armor together and lights from old toys we reused in the arm piece that opened up and made noises."

Because these costumes take so long to customize, Deegan has a deadline. "He always picks his theme by March, and I get to work. We always have to find something I can make/ attach or paint to a bike helmet with a lip so it holds it off his face, and then we hit up thrift stores and find all the items and reuse and repurpose them."

Here are a couple of others throughout the years that were big hits. Has anybody heard of Skibidi Toilet? This is one of the characters from those viral YouTube videos.

Cameraman with a working flash!

During COVID, they got creative with a candy chute on his astronaut suit.

When we met Deegan, he looked like this:

The Marvel character, Ghostrider!! Chrissy shared with me how she put this jaw-dropping look together: "It took me two months to get this one perfect and adjusted just right for him to wear comfortably."

"The jacket was thrifted, and I just hand-tacked some chains on it with thread and ran a battery-powered light in the pocket. His fake leather chaps are women's leggings that I cut out and hand-sewed." The butt-kicking boots were also thrifted from Goodwill.  "We just needed everything as light as possible, so it was easy to wear." The best part, they only spent about $30 for everything, plus, "I have tons of cellophane still left, I will wrap baskets with at Christmas."

"I glued battery-powered orange Christmas lights in a random pattern to the papier-mache helmet. I got rolls of cellophane that you use to wrap Easter baskets and cut them into long strips. Then, I used a heat gun to mold and melt them, and I glued them on one strip at a time. There is a button you press on the right side of his head to turn them on, and they do different patterns. The entire helmet is very lightweight."

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"We actually still have all the costumes except the astronaut one. He loved them so much that we have them stored in a tote here at home. He is hoping to attend Comic Con this coming year in Owensboro and wear them again." Chrissy loves making these costumes as much as Deegan loves rocking them. "For now, I wait to see what peaks his interest for next year. He will tell me something by March, and I will try my best to make it come to life for him. The smiles and happiness it gives him every year are so worth it."