Halloween: Jeweled Doll Head Pumpkins

 

This week's BFF Open House link party continues here. 

Since our nest has been empty, my Halloween decor has become much more "Gothelegant" which is a word I just this second made up to combine gothic and elegant. Lots of jewels and metallics. Less whimsical ( although I do have some of that too!). But let's just say about the Darth Vader meme "Come to the dark side, we have cookies" is a perfect fit for me! I've wanted to do something with an old doll head but my thrifting trips the past few years haven't yielded the kind of doll head I want so I'm still on that particular hunt BUT I found some creepy plastic doll heads in the Halloween stuff at Walmart and they just spoke to my deep dark little Wednesday Addams heart! 

Supplies 

• Doll Heads ( Walmart, $4.88 pkg of 3)
• Foam Pumpkins ( Dollar Tree, while things are still $1)
• Glass Candle Holder (Dollar Tree, ibid)
• Craft Paints (Apple Barrel Gloss Black, Craftsmart White)
• School Glue (Elmers)
• Glue gun / glue and strong cold bond glue ( eg E-6000, I used Beacon 3 In 1)

"They're creepy and they're kooky, they're altogether spooky". 

Dollar Tree has these foam pumpkins every year and they're great. You can paint them. You can cut them. You can wrap them in fabric. So many possibilities. For this project I painted them. 

They take paint really well and this Apple Barrel Gloss only needed one coat. Then I did my go to glue crackle. 

To finish the pumpkins, I went over the glue with white paint and then used my craft room blow dryer to hasten the crackling. 

The doll heads were already pretty perfect but what fun is that? I got out my silver Rub N Buff and just added some spots of it here and there. 

This highlighted the scars already on the heads and then I dry brushed and wiped off some black paint so it would get in the cracks. 

Creeptastic! Now it's time to glam them up. I had some clear flat backed jewels in my collection so I randomly glued them onto the skulls and finished with smaller self adhesive rhinestones. Glamtastic! 

Once you're satisfied with your jewels it's time to assembler. I used hot glue to attach the skulls to the painted pumpkins and then the Beacon 3 In 1 to attach the pumpkin to the candleholder. I have found that hot glue doesn't always last on glass but it will work, just may come loose after a while. 

It's so good to be back! 

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Til Death Do Us Part Couples Shower Candles

 Happy Halloween all! Hope those of you with Trick or Treaters are prepared for tonight. We are winging it. We have no idea if we'll get any at all but I was a Girl Scout so I'm prepared with candy ( my favorites just in case no one shows!).

My BFF just threw an amazing couples shower for "our" daughter and future son-in-law. The inside joke is that I'm her "real" mom because we tend to like a lot of the same things, and those things are very different from what my BFF tends to like. We all converge around Harry Potter!  Since we were pregnant together, there's always been a connection there.

The wedding isn't until January but "our" daughter LOVES Halloween and all things skully and gothic so October was the perfect time for the shower.

Supplies:

• Plain Prayer Candles (Dollar Tree)
• Black Vinyl ( I used Cricut Glossy Black)
• Skull Image ( downloaded from Silhouette online store)
• Decorative Paper ( I had this in my stash)
• Washi Tape (also stash)

Tip: if you need Dollar Tree items in a specific quantity and don't want to risk your store not having enough, you can order online and have sent to your store for you to pickup. I had a little hiccup with mine but it's the first time it's happened and luckily the store still had the 20 candles I needed.

I wrapped the bottom of 10 with the silver paper and 10 with the black and silver paper.

I used a strong double sided tape to adhere. I had some coordinating washi tape in my stash so I used it with the silver paper. 

My images were busy  cutting on my Cameo while I was wrapping the candles. Once they were cut, the fun began: weeding. Not my favorite part of vinyl, but oh so necessary! 

Weeding As Art ! These are all my little scraps removed from the images. 

Once the weeding was complete and the transfer tape applied, applying the images to the candles was easy peasy.  My BFF was so happy with them and they went perfectly with how she'd decorated for the shower. 

Mr. Skully's Hat and Mrs. Pumpkin's Mask

Continuing with my Gothic Halloween theme, I dressed up a gold leafed skull I made last year. I mean who doesn't make a top hat for a skull? 

My camera battery was dead while I was making this hat but it's a pretty simple construction. 

Supplies Needed: 

• Heavy scrapbook paper...cover weight or light chipboard weight. I used a chipboard weight glitter paper
• Strong adhesive or hot glue gun. I used Sookwang double sided tape or the "red liner" double sided tape works as well. 
• Embellishments ( I really just raided my stash for this)

To make the basic hat, I cut a circle in proportion to the head, with a slightly smaller circle for the top, and then a rectangle large enough to fit the circumference of your circle. Pinterest has lots of tutorials and all of the basic construction is the same.

The fun part is in the embellishments. I used some leftover tulle, paper roses and rolled paper roses that I made from scraps in my stash, along with leftover bits of ribbon and trim and a couple of glittered leaves. 

Mr. Skully needed a friend so I hooked him up with Mrs. Pumpkin, a glittery ceramic pumpkin I picked up for 60% off at Michaels. I decided rather than alter her permanently, I'd just give her a costume to wear that can be removed and she can stay on my mantel through Thanksgiving. 

For this, I just used a black masquerade mask (Creatology, Michaels) and added a nose made from glitter and metallic scrapbook paper, more rolled paper roses, and glitter leaves. Her "eyelashes" are black adhesive rhinestones! 

BOO! Don't they look ready to go to a Halloween Ball ? 

Happy Haunting Entryway

NOTE: This is a sponsored post. Supplies were provided to me. Opinions are mine. 

Halloween is one of my favorite decorating holidays. Over the years I've matured my decor, moving to a more "elegant" ( I hope!) and Gothic look. Each year I've either made or added a couple of new things so I didn't have to invest in a makeover all at once. 

These items from Oriental Trading Company fit right in with my transformation! 

This year I wanted to focus on my entryway and entryway  table. 

The Spiderweb candleabra was a perfect addition with these creepy crawly but not too scary spiders! 

My favorite item I used this year however was this Spiderweb table topper. I absolutely love this thing and need to get a couple more! 

The other thing I chose and with which I'm totally in love is this "Happy Haunting" sign. 

I knew I wasn't going to have a lot of time to make things this year so this is ready to go and can be placed on a wall, table, mantel. Easy peasy. 

I also re-did my railings keeping them simple with some tulle I've re-used over the years but adding Canvas Banners painted with chalkboard paint and hand drawn letters. But to make it stand out I added a gold glittered tulle bow and tied this together with my entryway table by adding the same bow to it. 

I re-purposed some tinsel trees to hold Poison Bottle ornaments. These are square Christmas ornaments with drips of paint inside, scraps of washi paper / tape and embellished with Enamel Labels from OTC. 

Happy Haunting! 

2016 Halloween: Gothic Pumpkin

I am working on some Halloween decorating and projects and whipped up a couple of fun faux pumpkins this weekend. Not showing the whole table on which these are displayed yet since that will be part of an upcoming sponsored post! 

This is an easy peasy project so I didn't take a lot of step by step pics. 

Supplies and Steps: 

• Faux pumpkin (small) ($9.99 ea less 60% sale)
• Glittered leaf bush ($4.99 lesss 50%)
• Glass Knob (Clearance $.50...yes fifty cents)
• Scrapbook Paper in gold metallic ($.10 on one of their 10 for $1 sales)
• Paper Roses (stash)
• Hot glue / glue gun

With the exception of the paper roses which I had on hand, all other supplies are from Michaels, and of course all supplies were on sale! Total cost to make two pumpkins was $10, or the regular price of one pumpkin.

Faux white pumpkin, glitter leaf bush, glass knob, messy desk

Make 6 rolled paper roses from the gold scrapbook paper, set aside. I used 3 per pumpkin. Pinterest has tons of tutorials on how to make these.  

Cut 6 leaves per pumpkin from the bush, hot glue to the pumpkin making a kind of crown. I did 4 (North, South, East, West) and then layered the remaining 2. 

I thought these glass knobs were awesome at $1.50 when they first came in but wasn't sure what I'd use them for. When I saw them for $.50 I bought several. I'd come up with something! 

Start a hole in the pumpkin stem and then screw in the glass knob. Hot glue three of the rolled roses to the stem and fill in any spaces with the paper roses and voila. 

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Halloween: French Gothic Coffin Boxes

A couple of years ago I had so much fun altering these little coffin shaped boxes I found at Michaels. Darn if they don’t keep stocking them and darn if I don’t keep finding ways to play with them.

It helps ( or doesn’t help depending on whether you’re Mr. Chocolate) that I love digging through clearance aisles and 50-60% off bins which is where I found the embellishments that inspired this project.

The metal Fleur de Lis and Crown pieces were in the $1.50-$3 bins and were 60% off when I found them. On a previous hunting expedition, I’d found the Jolee’s Boutique embellishments on sale. 

We went to France several years ago and while there we toured the Catacombs which are not for the faint of heart but an amazing piece of history. The ornate metal embellishments brought back memories of that trip and the coffin boxes brought back memories of the Catacombs so voila. Gothic Coffin Boxes. Welcome to my brain.

I left a couple of the boxes unpainted and painted the others black. Using the boxes as a template, traced around them and cut out coordinating papers and Mod Podge’d them onto the boxes.

I love it when  a plan goes awry. I intended to use the polka dot paper on the BACKS of each coffin and oops…one made it on the front. Oh well. Lemons / lemonade.

You can’t really see it but I crumpled the skull and bones paper before applying so it would be a little wrinkly. And for once, I was patient and let the boxes dry overnight so the paper would be good and stiff when I sanded the edges.
TIP: Package of emery boards from the Dollar store work great for this

I glued the metal embellishments to the front and added the Jolee’s embellishments as shown. Edged the boxes with torn pieces of  coordinating washi tape.

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