Halloween Costumes 2009

One of the most popular traditions for Halloween is dressing up. Either in a sexy Halloween costume or dressed as a superhero, everybody, from infants to grown ups love to party around and show off their best costumes.
But how did this tradition start? I found a bit of information that I would like to share with you.

The Celts (which included people from northern France, Ireland, England, Scotland, Wales, and Brittany) believed that on October 31st the Lord of Death, Saman, would call together all the souls that had died the previous year to travel to afterlife during the Vigil of Samhain. Ancestral ghosts and demons emerged from sidh (ancient mounds or barrows of the countryside) and were free to roam the earth, harm crops, and cause trouble (Bannatyne 1990). The living would often disguise themselves in ghoulish costumes so the spirits of the dead would think they were one of their own and pass by without incident. The masked villagers would also form parades to lead the spirits out to the town limits. In addition to masks and costumes and, arguably, as a precursor to modern-day trick-or-treating, the Celts would also offer food to Saman to persuade him to more be temperate as he judged their ancestors. Additionally, the Celts would lay out food for their weary ancestors traveling to the other world or to appease spirits who were looking for trouble

Some enterprising business person saw the marketing possibilities for Halloween costumes and soon there was much more available than just frightening monsters. A veritable plethora of pirates, fairies, clowns and superheroes, such as Batman and Superman began showing up alongside more traditional costumes. This idea continues to develop with the changing times and current costume trends include firefighters and police officers as well as various military uniforms from around the world and historical outfits like Roman soldiers or even a medieval Knight.

If you are looking for a quick and inexpensive costume, it is quite usual to "create" a costume from basic everyday clothing. The idea is to make yourself look just the opposite of your usual style of dress.

Halloween is the one of the greatest and best known party holidays on the western calendar, ranking third behind New Years Eve Parties at number one and Super Bowl parties at number two. In terms of business, Halloween ranks right behind Christmas in the amount of money people spent on it. Today Americans spend an estimated $6.9 billion every year on the Halloween tradition. Halloween is a fun secular holiday enjoyable to anyone despite their personal cultural or religious beliefs. The Halloween season remains a yearly celebration and the fun of wearing costumes will be part of this culture for a long, long time.

With the advent of Hollywood movies beginning to appear all over the country around this time, actors like Lon Chaney, known for his Wolf-Man character and Bela Lugosi, who brought to life the vampire Count Dracula, gave the country the perfect creepy inspiration for Halloween costumes.

Witches, blood thirsty vampires, moaning ghosts, vicious werewolves and many other frightening monsters became the popular choices of trick or theaters every where. Thus the American idea of a creepy Halloween was born. Dressing in costumes gives one the opportunity to "let their hair down" and be someone else for a while, all in good fun of course.

With the increasing popularity of "tricks or treats", children soon joined the adults in costumes and before long Halloween night was filled with spooky, creepy, frightening, or even funny and cute costumed folks going door to door begging for goodies.

Analyzing Google's search trends these are some of the most popular searches
related to Halloween costumes for 2009:

*Infant Halloween costumes*
*Toddler Halloween costumes*
*Baby Halloween costumes*
*Plus size Halloween costumes*
*Dog Halloween costumes*

Seems like kids and pets are the ones that have the most fun on Halloween, lol

So... here is a list of the best ones, so you don't have to waste your time looking for them!