How to Dress Up Like Toys

Dress up as a Rubik's Cube by taking a large square box, cutting off the top flaps, turning it upside down, and cutting holes in the sides and bottom for your head and arms to fit through. Nine multicolored squares should be on each side of the box. You can paint them on, or cut out squares of construction paper. Wear all black clothing underneath.

Dress up as a jack-in-the-box by taking a large square box and cutting holes for your head and arms, as above. Paint the box bright, playful colors. Attach a crank to the side on your back. Wear a clown wig and clown makeup. Wear big clown shoes and clown pants or overalls if you can find some.

Make a Mr. Potato Head costume using either a Mr. Potato Head toy or construction paper to create the same pieces. Take a plain skin-colored T-shirt. Attach the toy pieces from the Mr. Potato Head onto your T-shirt by punching holes in the shirt with a hole punch, inserting the nub on the back side of each toy piece through the holes and fastening them with duct tape on the inside of the shirt. If you don't have a Mr. Potato Head toy, draw and cut out a nose, lips, eyes and ears from construction paper and tape them to your shirt.

To create a crayon costume, first measure the height of the person who will dress up. Cut a piece of felt 2 inches longer than their height, in the color of crayon they wish to be. Sew or glue Velcro strips to the long edge of the felt. Attach them together to create a large tube shape that fits around the person. Cut a hole out of the plain side of the tube for the person's head to fit through, and two holes on the sides for their arms. You might also add slits at the knees to help the person walk. Take black felt and cut out big felt letters that spell "Crayola" and glue them onto the side. You might also cut out and glue on the name of the color, such as "Yellow." Add a strip of black felt around the top and bottom edges of the costume to imitate a crayon's wrapper. Cut out a large circle of stiff paper to make a triangle cone hat (like a party hat) to place on top of the person's head. Cover it in the colored felt to make the tip of the crayon. Add a piece of elastic to put under the person's chin to keep the hat from falling off. Wear a black long-sleeved shirt, black tights or pants, and black shoes under the crayon costume.

Create a teddy bear costume: For the tail, glue a brown pompom to the back of a pair of brown sweatpants. For the ears, draw and cut out teddy bear ear shapes on cardboard. Glue brown felt to both sides of the cardboard ears. Glue ears on to a headband. Cut slits in the hood of a brown hooded sweatshirt where a teddy bear's ears would be. Put the headband inside the hood and push the ears through the hood slits. Sew or glue the headband to the inside of the hood. For the stomach, cut out a big oval of brown felt and sew or glue to the front of the sweatshirt. Put on the sweatshirt and pull up the hood. Tie a wide ribbon around your neck and make a bow. Use face paint to give yourself a black nose. Wear brown socks and gloves for paws.