My new Halloween display piece for this year.
Other than the "cat ears", I think it turned out pretty well =)
Here are some closeup photos and details:
The bats and feet are made from Styrofoam balls.
I have no idea what size they are since they were
from my stash of loose Styrofoam balls.
You need two large balls for the bodies
and two smaller balls for the feet.
Cut the two smaller balls in half to make the feet.
Stick a skewer or dowel rod into each foam ball before
you start to make a handle to hold onto.
I lightly coated the foam balls with a thick decorators paste
first to try to smooth them out, filling in the little gaps a bit
before painting. I allowed them to dry 24 hours.
I painted using glossy black acrylic craft paints and a paint brush.
While the paint was still wet, I sprinkled on glitter then let them
set for another 24 hours to make sure they were dry.
I made my own pattern for the wings and ears,
cut them out from Basic Black card stock
then sprayed them with a homemade shimmer mist.
I use rubbing alcohol and a dab of shimmery Lumiere
metallic paint, mix well in a small mister bottle.
I don't have an exact ratio / recipe,
I just "eyeball" it but I'm sure you can find
many references online to making your own.
While the wings were still slightly damp from the spray,
I carefully bent them into shape.
The ears were made the same way.
The mouth was hand painted on with a small paintbrush
and white acrylic craft paint.
The fangs were cut from scraps of the glossy white card stock.
I had to use a toothpick to dab on a tiny bit of Tombow liquid glue
then use tweezers to apply each fang, they are tiny !
I have lots of small googlie eyes, but needed larger ones so I made my own.
They were made from Whisper White and Basic Black card stock
punched with small circle punches. I added a dot of silver metallic ink
(white gel pen or white paint would work just as well, I happened to have that marker
on my work space so I used it) to the black circle, glued it to the top of the
Whisper White then covered both with Crystal Effects clear dimensional glue/accent.
Once dry, they were glued on with the Tombow liquid glue.
I created the "happy happy" tag by inking a stamp with a marker.
It is from the "Think Happy Thoughts" stamp set by Stampin' Up!
The stamp says "happy birthday", but by using a water based marker,
I was able to ink only the "happy" and stamp it twice,
twisting the stamp around so the second stamping
lines up with the gap where "birthday" would have been.
I used a Pumpkin Pie marker to ink the image that was stamped on
glossy white card stock,
punched out with a 1 3/8" circle punch and
glued on top of a metal edge tag.
The little pumpkin was made with a 1/2" circle punch,
Pumpkin Pie marker and card stock, Close To Cocoa card stock.
I used yellow green rhinestones as accents.
Hot glue the completed tag to the center of the bows.
Using the Alphadots stamp set from Stampin' Up!,
I stamped onto Green Galore card stock with
Versamark ink then heat embossed them with black
embossing powder.
I punched them out with a circle punch
slightly larger than the embossed area.
A purple metallic permanent marker was used to
carefully color over the green outer edge.
The metallic shimmer of the ink doesn't show up well.
It would have been easier if I had the correct size punches
to punch around each letter then punch out a slightly larger
circle to mat it onto, but I don't so this is what I came up with.
The rosettes behind the letters were made with orange
Paper Twist. I cut a 1/2" wide strip the width of the twist
( I'm guessing about 5" long?).
Glue the two short ends together to form a circle.
Stand the circle up on end, then carefully smoosh it down flat
so that it makes a rosette / medallion / lollipop flower .
Low temp hot glue was perfect to glue these into place on the back of the letters
then to glue them onto the flags.
I lightly brushed on the shimmery metallic Lumiere paint
to some of the raised portions of the rosette.
The little flags are cut from two papers that were in an old
Die Cuts With A View Fall stack I have.
They were 1 1/2" wide by 4" long.
The bottoms were punched with a square punch.
I normally use scissors to make the cuts, but since I had
so many to make and that would be on display next to each other,
I wanted them to look more uniform.
I folded over the top edge then used my sewing machine
threaded with purple thread to do a zig zag stitch across the tops.
I ran a piece of 1/8" purple satin ribbon through the pockets.
The ghost is a foamie shape that came in a bucket full
of Halloween foam shapes I bought for my kids.
They never used them so once in a while I remember them
and put a piece to use.
I painted it with the Lumiere shimmery metallic paint,
but it wasn't shiny enough so I sprinkled on white glitter.
It was hot glued to the center of the bow I made.
I made the orange organdy ribbon with black bats
by using rubber stamps and black Stazon ink, oh so easy !
The stamp is from the Halloween Backgrounds stamp set
by Stampin' Up!.
Be sure to stamp the ribbon on scrap paper, the ink may
bleed through and stain whatever is underneath !
Polka dot ribbon from my stash, unknown manufacturer.
This is the first time I've made a pumpkin from paper strips.
Tip: use double sided paper or solid core colored card stock to look
more finished (note the inside of mine is white).
I decided to use this light weight paper so it would be more flexible to
bend the papers easier to shape my little pumpkin.
I don't care for the white on the inside.
Of course after the fact I thought to myself
"Why didn't I brayer on ink over the white ?!?"
I used the two step Bird punch from Stampin' Up!
to make the leaves.
Two thin strips of decorative paper were wrapped around
a dowel to make the twisty, vine pieces.
I almost forgot, I added a piece of skewer painted black
to the backs of the wings that the banner ends are glued to.
I didn't even try it without the support skewers,
knowing that the weight of the banner
would make the wings droop.
Insert one end into the foam ball,
hot glue the other to the back of the wing.
This also shows how I attached the wings and ears:
I simply cut slits with my Xacto knife
and carefully inserted them.
I didn't bother to add any glue since
the pieces fit snugly enough.
I was afraid of making a big mess if I tried anyway.
You would cut and insert the wings and ears after
they are totally dry and the foam balls have been
painted / glittered / dried.
inspiration from Crafts 'N Things magazine -
I should have looked at it a little bit closer and
taken note of the ears. Oh well.......
I made this up as I went, I did not have any instructions or patterns.
My original plan was to attach them to a wreath, hanging them upside down.
The grapevine wreath I had in stock wasn't quite large enough,
it didn't look right to me.
I knew that I wanted to have them holding the banner
and they would not stand upright so they were going to need a base.
I dug around and came across the slat of wood I have had for years and years
(I had intended on possibly wood burning something into it).
It was the perfect size to use as the base that I could hot glue the bats to
(although I should have stained it or added fake grass,
something because it looks too plain).
I'm entering this project in several challenges:
F4A137 Rosettes at splitcoaststampers.com
WT395 What Are The Odds at splitcoaststampers.com
I hope my paper strip pumpkin and miniature punched pumpkin on the tag make my project
"pumpkin-y" enough to fit these two challenges as well ;)
Thanks for looking =)
