The 2 books I ordered - before I started asking - are: Puppet Planet: The Most Amazing Puppet-Making Book in the Universe and Puppet Mania!

Those books are quite good. I know a lot of people who like them. I have the latter myself although I've never actually looked at it since I bought it. (Too many books, not enough time!)

For costumes, you can save yourself some dough. This free e-book is excellent:
http://www.puppetpub.com/costumes.html
It doesn't contain patterns, but then the explanations work no matter what you're making or what size it is.

If you have a look to Puppeteers Unite website, I think you will have a good idea of everything related to Project Puppet pattern, since there is a tutorial using one of their patterns.
http://puppeteersunite.com/
Click in tutorials, in the right side of the screen

I agree with the others that 'The Foam Book' is fantastic starter and Project Puppet patterns are everyone's go to.  However I have some other resources that are free.

If you are on Facebook, I run a page at www.facebook.com/MakingPuppets and in the photos sections, I have many pictures of patterns I have used in the past, taken under a 1" x 1" grid so you can recreate them.

I also have a blog that has some tutorials at: http://puppetsmitharts.blogspot.com/  I'm not fond of the blog format, but there are step-by-step pictures and explanations there of a few styles.

Also, personally, much of what I learned at the beginning, I learned from Stiq Puppets on YouTube.

Hope these help!

I think the Puppet Planet and Puppet Mania were good at getting you excited about puppets and getting you started thinking outside the box about different types of puppets and materials to use. Kids love those books, great pictures and interesting ideas.  For my money the Project Puppets patterns are closest to the quality of puppet I like.  I love the body pattern it adds so much to the puppet. Stiq Puppets really helps you "SEE" how to do what those patterns say and he does such quality work, his videos are amazing.