If you un-check the "Block" box in the "Display" tab of your item, it won't block the player or other NPCs. I think items would probably be the best way to go...
Making a idle animation would be simple. you just need to have a standing frame with a event linked to it that does to things: set a global, say, "gb_Standing?" to 1 and set the player animation to "Standing NE" or whatever dierection you happen to be facing when you stop. Then, every time you press a arrow key to move, it links to a event that checks if "gb_Standing?" is 1. If it is, then it changes the player animation to your walking animation and sets the global to 0 again. I think this would work, but it would make mouse movement users get to fly around as a standing guy and have 0 attack delay.