Halloween is a-coming! My son tried on and fell in love with a backhoe costume made out of felt and fabric. My husband wanted to buy the costume for $20, but I stood my ground. We could easily make one, an even cooler one with a loader and bucket that moves! My son was convinced and excited to get home and start on our new project: the backhoe cardboard costume.

I enjoy these moments when we can find some use for the many Amazon boxes that we have. Plus, what better way to entertain kids than letting them help paint! um… yes, it could be a little bit more work in terms of mess and clean up. Yes, it could take a little bit more time with the kids’ help. And sometimes the perfectionist in me wants to take away the paintbrushes from them and do it all by myself. But I digress… what better way to help the kids feel a sense of accomplishment in making things they want and for mom to practice self-control!

This backhoe cardboard costume can be easily made with 2 cardboard boxes. Pick as small of a box as possible to make trick or treating as enjoyable as possible. Smaller boxes will allow your child to move around more easily while wearing the costume.

Since I promised my son moving parts, I had to create cardboard hinges so that the loader and bucket could lift up and down. Don’t let these enhancements deter you from making this backhoe cardboard costume! These instructions can be easily simplified. Of course, you can also enhance these instructions more by cutting out wheels instead of just painting them on to give a more 3-D look.

As soon as we put the finishing touches on the backhoe, both kids entertained themselves for countless hours. I wish it was countless hours; it was more like half an hour. They wore the backhoe around the house and used it to push things around. It was a pseudo vacuum cleaner that helped to pick up toys. I’m crossing my fingers that the backhoe cardboard costume doesn’t break before Halloween!

Hope everyone has a safe and fun Halloween!

Backhoe Cardboard Costume

Active Time2

Total Time2

Keyword: cardboard costume, craft, do-it-yourself

Materials

2 cardboard boxes My boxes are 13.75 x 10.5 x 5 inches (LxWxH) when closed. The height increases to 15in, when all flaps are opened.
wrapping paper cardboard tube (30 inches long) or glue several toilet paper rolls together
wooden chopsticks like those you get from Chinese take out
scissors / exacto knife
ruler
pencil
hot glue gun and glue sticks
Crayola Washable Kids Paint (yellow, black)
paintbrushes

Instructions

Create the Cab of the Backhoe

Cut off the bottom flaps of your first cardboard box. Keep the flaps, we will use it to make the bucket portion of the backhoe in the next section.
The main cab will have a tube extending out from it. This tube will attach to another that connects to the bucket. I used a wrapping paper cardboard tube because it was long. If you don't have this available, you can always use multiple toilet paper roll cardboard glued together to the length that you desire.
On one end of the cab, line up the diameter of the cardboard tubing to the edge.
Make marks where the outer perimeter of the tubing meets the cardboard cab. Cut 2 inch slits where the marks are at.
We will later insert this tubing and hot glue it to the cab. I cut the wrapping paper tube down to around 13.5 inches for this portion of the bucket attachment.

Create the Bucket of the Backhoe

Fold one of the longer rectangular flaps that was leftover from the previous section so that it's claw like. This will form the shape of the bucket base. While in this "claw like" form, trace an outline of this claw on another piece of cardboard flap and cut it out. This piece will be one of the sides of the bucket.
Once cut out, label the cardboard pieces so that you know how the sides of the bucket attach to the bucket base. I used "L" to designate left and "R" to designate right side.
Create a mirror image of the side bucket and cut it out. (Note: I should have flipped the "R" cardboard so that the "blank" cardboard is facing down instead of up when I created the mirror image to give a cleaner look).
Use a ruler to mark off "teeth" for the bucket and cut out the shaded portions.
These are the the pieces that we will be hot gluing together to form a bucket! In the picture, there is a small 4inch tube that was cut from the original wrapping paper tube. We will attach this tube to another tube later on to connect to the cab.
On the non-teeth end of the bucket, line up the diameter of the cardboard tubing to the edge. Make marks where the outer perimeter of the tubing meets the cardboard cab. Cut 2 inch slits where the marks are at.
In order for the bucket to move up and down and be able to scrape at things, we need cardboard hinges (2 sets)! You can simplify this design by just having one set of hinges so that the bucket can move up and down but not be able to scrape at things. You can further simplify the design more by not having hinges at all and have a bucket that doesn't move. To create these hinges, poke holes through the tubes with a pencil or something sharp.
Cut a rectangle around the poked holes.
Connect the two hinges with a chopstick (can easily shorten the chopstick with a scissor).
Here's a brief look at what the connected hinges should look like!

Create the Loader of the Backhoe

Open and lay flat the first cardboard box. Lay the cardboard box so that the "blank" side of the cardboard is facing down. This will give you a cleaner look at the end of the project. Section 3 should be cut so that it's about the same size as Section 1. We will use this piece of the cardboard to make the loader portion of the backhoe.
Cut off the the bottom 2 corner flaps. Use a ruler to draw a line to connect the corners of the top rectangles. This will create 2 triangles in each of the rectangles. The shaded areas will be discarded later.
On the bottom flap, line up the ruler so that its edge touches the edge of the cardboard box. Draw a line across the top of the ruler.
Turn the ruler so that it's vertical and draw bars the width of the ruler. As you can see in mine, the squares are not perfect, which is ok!
Cut out all the shaded portions.
You should be left with something that can be hot glued together along the edges to form a loader.
The loader will attach to the cab, as pictured.

Painting & Assembly

It's easier for my kids to paint on flat surface. So I opted to flatten everything, paint, then assemble. You can always assemble and hot glue the cardboard as you go, if that's your preferred method!
Most everything was painted yellow. Note, Crayola Washable Paints don't do as great of a job as spray paint, but it's smell free and with multiple coats, it was good enough for my kids.
After the paint drys, hot glue everything together. The hinges can be held together by the chopsticks. After inserting the chopsticks, I added some hot glue around the chopstick ends to make sure that the hinges won't slip off. The loader can be attached to main cab with hot glue. However, if you would like a loader that can lift up and down, create two rectangular pieces of cardboard (about 8.5 inches long). One end of the rectangle should attach to the loader and the other end should attach to the main cab. Poke holes where you want the rectangles to attach and use chopsticks to hold them in place. Again, add some hot glue around the chopstick ends to make sure the rectangle won't slip off.
After the backhoe was assembled, we painted on the windows and wheels for the cab.
To wear the backhoe, I stuck suspenders on the backhoe. You can also tie string to the cardboard that will fit over your child's shoulders. And wa-la, we're done!