Vegetables and Fruits -- Homemade Costume for Nutrition Week Celebrations in Schools (updated - July 2013)

July is touted in the country as Nutrition Month. Schools, private and public, incorporate everything about NUTRITION in their lessons and school activities. The usual activities are slogan making, poster making and essay writing contests. In some schools they do cooking demos. Some invite professionals to do demos while others utilize their home economics or livelihood education students. In other schools they have what they call the nutrition parade. They ask students to wear costumes that show the concept of good nutrition.

An easy way to make a homemade costume for your child is to make a vegetable or fruit headdress. To do this you just need to draw (or print if you're not that good in drawing) big versions of vegetables or fruits using cartolina or cardboard.Then cut the figure out and attach to a cap or hat. To be consistent with the vegetable or fruit you've chosen, let your child wear a shirt of the same color as the one on his head.

Another option is to make a bigger version of the one described above to have something that your child can put over his body. You actually need to make two cutouts for the front and the back. You just need to connect them using wide garter, string or piece of cloth so your child can wear the costume over his shoulders like a spaghetti-strapped dress.

Another variation would be to make a big illustration of  a fruit or a vegetable. Then cut a hole in front -- just big enough for the face. You can use a piece of  garter so your child can wear it like a mask.

You can also attach real fruits and vegetables on a big hat. This is more authentic. But be mindful that this is a rather heavy nutrition week costume. lol

If you have enough budget there are also costume stores where you can buy ready made vegetable or fruit costumes. There are also dressmakers who will be willing to make a dress for your kid.

If you have old fairy tale/cartoon charater costumes, you can also use them for nutrition week. So how exactly do you relate them to nutrition week? Just be creative. Here are some tips to do it. If your child has
 (1) Bumble bee costume: make a big jar of honey (see Winnie the pooh's jar as pattern)
 (2) Snow White: let your child carry a basket filled with big red apples
 (3) Cinderella: let her carry a pumpkin (don't make it into a wagon lol)
 (4) Butterfly costume: let her bring squash flowers (available in some wet markets)
 (5) Robinhood: let him bring a sack full of French bread.
 (6) Little Red Riding Hood: let your child carry a basket of bread and cheese
 (7) Bugs Bunny: oh I'm sure you know what to let your child bring.
 (8) Mickey Mouse: let your child bring cheese, what else :)
 (9) Minion: let your child bring bananas (yeah, they have the same color, hihihi)
 (10) Ironman: remember that scene where Ironman was eating donuts? If  you do, then you know what to let your child bring. ;) 

There are so many things you  can do to make vegetable or fruit costume. You just need some creativity.

Note: Click here for new Fruit and Vegetable Costume Ideas.