Then & Now: 10 Awkward Female Child Stars Who Grew Up to Be Gorgeous (PHOTOS)

As a beauty pageant contestant sporting glasses and baby fat, nerdy Abigail Breslin stole moviegoers' hearts in Little Miss Sunshine.

Now the actress, who stars in Fox's new series Scream Queens, is more of a heartbreaker. She's filled out in all the right places and is drop-dead gorgeous!

With her huge, expressive eyes and spunky attitude, Michelle Trachtenberg charmed audiences on film in movies such as Harriet the Spy as well as TV (The Adventures of Pete and Pete).

The actress has built a career playing beautiful villians in guest spots on TV. Considering her dramatic look — stick-straight dark hair against fair skin, it's no wonder she nails it. 

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Across Cousin Skeeter's three seasons, Meagan Good was the perfect picture of a teen girl in transition, experimenting with eyebrow shapes, hairstyles, and clothes.

All the experimenting paid off. Meagan Good is now polished and beautiful, a knockout on shows like Sleepy Hollow and the new Minority Report on Fox.  

It was the 1980s, obviously. On Full House, Candace Cameron Bure's hair appeared feathered, pulled into a side ponytail, curled, poufed, and straightened. It had so many looks it was almost a separate character on the show.

After battling bulimia in her twenties, the Full House actress showed off her moves — as well as her figure — on Dancing With the Stars, coming in at third place. She recently showed her beauty was more than skin deep, publishing a book, Dancing Through Life, which details how her faith has helped her overcome challenges.

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The world got to know Alexa Vega as the resourceful kid with the serious face in the Spy Kids movies. 

Is that you, Alexa? The actress worked hard to put her tomboy image behind her. She clearly traded it in for a much more glamorous one, complete with a sexy body and lovely face. It's hard to connect her to the awkward little girl we saw on the big screen.

When you're a child star on a long-running TV show like the Cosby Show, millions of people see you grow up before their eyes — and so it was with Keisha Knight Pulliam. She shed her baby teeth and wore enough colorful Cosby sweaters to make her awkward phase even more so. 

Rudy Huxtable grew up to be a lovely, graceful beauty, inside and out: She founded a mentoring camp for disadvantaged kids and leads workshops designed to help child actors and their parents navigate Hollywood. She's also drop-dead gorgeous. 

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Lopsided ponytails and hippie clothes were the hallmark of Cynthia, the starry-eyed love interest of the title character on Malcolm in the Middle, played by Tania Raymonde. When Cynthia left for Europe for a while, you couldn't help but hope she stopped off in fashionable Paris.

An exotic beauty whose mother is from Corsica, Tania Raymonde went on to star in Lost and garner positive reviews for playing a real-life killer in the Jodi Arias: Dirty Little Secret.

A simple, mousy dye job took Dakota Fanning from cute to creepy in the thriller Hide and Seek. She was so convincing as a little hellraiser that moviegoers wondered if she would stay goth forever.  

She's one of the rare child stars who has made a smooth, scandal-free transition into an adult career. Even her simple but beautiful look—platinum locks, little makeup and age-appropriate clothes, seem calculated enough to keep attention focused on her work (not that we're complaining). She's a terrific actress.

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Matching flower hats, matching orange shirts, matching scrunchies on matching side ponytails. Sure, Mary-Kate and Ashley's DVDs made them rich and even more famous than Full House ever did, but they were clearly produced before their fashion awakening.

It seems the twins took control of their look as soon as possible, developing their own hairstyles and fashion aesthetics. They soon became fashion world darlings whose every clothing choice became a trend. The attention was enough that they ultimately became fashion designers themselves. 

Most people met Isabelle Fuhrman when she played an adult murderer trapped in a child's body in Orphan, and let's be honest: Her pallor paired with dark hair and intense eyes made for one creepy-looking kid, both onscreen and off.

Fast forward a few years and a taller Isabelle Fuhrman, star of The Hunger Games and Masters of Sex, debuted a softer look with a heart-shaped face that perfectly frames her big brown eyes. 

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