In a momentary mental lapse, I agreed to a group costume idea that will involve me making a costume of Lady Gaga’s infamous Kermit outfit. The reasons for this plan don’t really matter here, but what is important is that I find a method to achieve this plan by Halloween without spending a bajillion dollars.
Obviously, I’m planning to make a much crappier version of this.
Unfortunately, Kermit dollars are running around $15 a pop. I don’t mind springing for a couple (especially for the hat) but I definitely can’t afford to buy enough to make this costume work.
Anyone know where I can get some dangly frog dolls that would look close enough? Being in Iowa, an online store rather than brick-and-mortar would be ideal since we don’t have everything in reasonable driving distance, but any ideas are welcome.
Oriental Trading company has lots of general “frog” merchandise including finger puppets at 72 for $10. Not as Kermitty as you want but definitely cheaper and recognizable for the effect.
Another idea is making frogs out of paper plates example shown here which you could easily make cheaply yourself.
That’s just one more example of how the rich are different from you and me. Never mind designer gowns, gold and jewels, yachts and Jaguars and Maybachs! They can afford REAL Kermit dolls! $15 a head is chump change to them!
I would go with pictures of Kermie. You can say you are “Low Rent Lady GaGa”.
Actually, this was a good idea. I found some similar sites where I can get floppy frog dolls (not all that Kermity but not bad) for $4 each, which is more in the right range. Still, I’d love more ideas.
The thrift store things (others have suggested garage sales) would be inexpensive, but unlikely to turn up much and extremely time consuming, so it’s probably out until I find myself really bored here in the next few weeks. Des Moines is really spread out, mind you. I am putting up a Craigslist ad though.
Can you sew? Personally, I’d just sew a bunch of green tubes, stuff them and add some styrofoam “eyeballs” and maybe some bits of red. No one is going to look that closely and you can decapatate a couple of real Kermits for authenticity but the costume is really mostly arms and legs.
Somewhere in here is a “tastes like chicken” joke but damned if I can find it.
This is my thought, even if your sewing skills are more like “I know how to use a Swingline stapler”… you could even skip the eyeballs and red fabric. Go to a fabric store, buy a few bolts of green felt, cut and shape into tubes, baste together large-diameter tubes with smaller-diameter ones “bodies” with arms and legs. You could quickly hack out some flipper-like shapes and staple them on the end of the tubes, too. Make this the base of your costume, then top sparingly with the more expensive Kermit doll parts.
Great idea! And if one uses a stiff enough felt, you wouldn’t even need to stuff the legs…they’ll form tubes on their own (and probably be more comfortable to wear too). Plus felt+hot glue gun=almost a match made in heaven.
I wouldn’t go with a couple of bolts though, felt is usually 72" wide and 10 or 20yards to a bolt. That’s a LOT of felt. I’d start with 2-3 yards of 72" width.
