Laundry Hamper + Creativity = R2-D2

OK, I confess I was skeptical when the idea was first floated. But Halloween is one the geekmom’s favorite holidays in our house and I held my tongue, because I knew deep down she would pull it off. And she’s outdone herself (again) this year with what looks to be a rocking R2-D2 getup for our 6-year-old son Arlo.

The key ingredients to making our little first grader into everyone’s favorite robot were one of those collapsible laundry hampers ($1 at a local thrift store), a round screened dish cover that you use at picnics to keep the bugs off your food, and lots of foil, felt, and duct tape. Sorry I don’t have a completed costume photo to share, there’s still a few details to be worked out, but I wanted to get this post up before Halloween.

We’ll be going trick-or-treating as a family theme this year, Arlo’s older brother will be C-3PO, geekmom is working up a Princess Leia outfit (but not "the sexy Princess Leia" she warns me), and I’ll be throwing a brown sheet over myself and waving around a blue light saber (which I just had to go out and buy because none of our other light sabers were "Obi-Wan blue"). We watched the first Star Wars movie the other night to get in the mood and so Arlo could start practicing his R2-D2 sound effects. Sometimes he sounds more like an injured bird, but he’s getting better.

I’ve been practicing my lines too. I can guarantee that everyone else is the family is very sick of hearing "These are not the droids you’re looking for…"