Barbie Party: Costumes

Since our Barbie Party was actually a runway show, I needed to scrounge up some glamorous costumes. Our girls were to be "living" Barbies, after all. They needed some fabulous looks!
Our girls are bigger now, so my "in-house" collection was not much help. We've outgrown literally and figuratively the princess assortment. (My daughter went so far as to keep the costumes, but cut off any visible connection to Disney... meaning the jewel with Snow White's face that fell off when she was 4 that she demanded I immediately sew back on, was snipped off and thrown away when she was 6! Farewell, Disney! We had a good run!)

Luckily our party was after Halloween, so there were great costumes out there, on clearance. Here are some of the ones I snatched up:

And I hit Target, Wal-mart and K-Mart for wigsm flapper costumes, etc.
I also shopped the girls dept in these stores for fun hats, shoes and dresses with sequins and animal print.
And, of course I sewed some too! I had leftover fabric from my mother, seriously 80's and tacky. 

I hit upon a sale at Kmart and bought ladies' sized wedges in 5-5.5, each pair were $2 on clearance. And my friend with with little feet loaned us about 6 pairs of shoes.

The shoe collection... boots to wedges to flip flops... the girls actually used flip flops the most!

Hats and wigs... my daughter and one friend used mainly. The surprise HIT of the accessories options: stuffed animals!
They all wanted a toy poodle or pet. I found great purses to choose from, but the success would've been free!

See all the purses! I used every bed in our house as a "station".

My friend found all these clip-on earrings at a yard sale. The girls went nuts, but they all complained that they hurt!

Make-up. Here's best things I learned: having their make-up done was more important to them than accessories,
and more important than their hair! Most did not want their hair done! My 16 year old cousin did fancy eye shadows
on the girls and she had a line at all times waiting!

David's Bridal!

 And let's just give a nod to the Thrift Store! I spent many a day checking the thrift store and I hit gold, many times. The favorite costume of all was a David's Bridal thrift store purchase, clearly a jr. bridesmaid dress. I ended up with some fabulous dresses and even 1-2 pairs of new shoes!

In the end, here are my tips:
1. Get costumes at the thrift store. There are plenty of tacky, prom-like dresses for girls to be had!
2. Don't go all out for accessories, put out a ton of stuffed animals
3. Have some extra hands to give full make-up treatments, the more eye shadow, the better.
4. Get every girl a pair of cheap flip flops and hot glue gems to them. They can be a favor and they will look fabulous on the runway.

Here are Mattel's tips: