Halloween Costume Madness

My office held a fall festival on Friday, complete with a costume contest, chili cookoff and bake-off. Never the one to skip out on an opportunity to dress up or cook, I participated by wearing a costume and chili cookoff. My actual Halloween costume wouldn't have made sense without the husband (not to mention it wasn't made yet) so I went with an old standard and easy costume.

Some photos from the day (thankfully I wasn't the only employee to participate in dressing up):

HR does its best Smooth Criminal impression.

Gene is...? Redneck?

Balloon Boy's dad. This was one of my favorite costumes (gotta love a pop culture or current events reference costume)

These ladies called themselves "Ebony and Ivory."

There was food (baked goods here).

And more food (chili).

Julie was someone from NCIS (I don't watch the show but I heard she was spot on)

Can you guess what this is?

Love this costume. "The Most Interesting Man in the World" (aka the Dos Equis man)

Yep, I wore regular clothes from my closest and donned a collapsable witches hat.

I had to save my real costume for Saturday night. :)

We had a Marilyn and a Xena.

Flash forward to Saturday night. I PROMISE that Dan planned to do this costume before the untimely death of the infomercial star himself. If you look below, you'll understand more about 1) why I wouldn't make sense by myself and 2) why I wouldn't have been able to sit down at work wearing this.

Self explanatory, right?

I think Dan's look was perfect. Kudos to Maria for suggesting I be the infomercial prop.

Anna planned to rock my American Gladiator costume from last year. She went ahead and made this shield in preparation. Too bad I couldn't find it. AT THE VERY LAST MINUTE. Two hours, $5 fabric and a royal blue long john's shirt later, she had a costume. Phew. I'm glad I have that sewing machine.

Photo evidence of costume construction project:

Alan (Anna's bf) was a creepy old flasher. Yes, he really did shave the top of his head.

Kyle and Maria were totally authentic (mummy and Cleopatra).

I already can't wait for next year. I LURVE Halloween.