Pumpkin Fun!

When the October issue of Country Living arrived in the mail, I was intriqued by the pumpkins on the magazine cover. Check it out here. I quickly turned to the instruction page for how to make their gorgeous decoupaged pumpkins. This is my version...........

It's not quite so gorgeous as the ones that you will find in their magazine (there are 40 pumpkin ideas at their link .......  Pumpkin*Decorating*Ideas!!!).  However, my husband says this looks like a "happy pumpkin". And that is a real compliment coming from my husband. LOL!  The instructions provided info on how to paint/stencil or decoupage real or styrofoam pumpkins. I chose styrofoam so that they will last for a few years!  The paper I used on my version is candy corn printed tissue paper. It worked great but I should have been more careful in lining up the candy corn. The leaves are fake but the acorns are real and from our oak tree in the backyard. The stem is Sculpey clay, green and brown blended, shaped and scored to sort of resemble a pumpkin stem. The styrofoam pumpkins came from the Dollar*Tree store. I did buy one at a craft store but it was a bit pricey and I thought I would wait til after Halloween and get some at half-price so I can make more for next year. There were only three at the Dollar*Tree store. Can you tell which ones are the fake pumpkins in the photo below?............

Oh, you guessed already!!!!! LOL! They were, of course, only a dollar each and were perfect for practicing my rusty decoupage skills. I cut off the stems right away as I knew I would make stems from clay or use chunks of tree branches for stems.

You can see in the photo below that the candy corn pumpkin has been covered and just getting multiple coats of decoupage sealer. I found the rusty orange cotton fabric at JoAnn's. It was perfect pumpkin fabric and I bought what was left........1-1/4 yards. Working with the paper was fun, but I really liked the fabric. I really wanted it to work, so I wrapped the fabric around the pumpkin, then cut, snipped, glued, then cut, snipped, and glued some more until I had just the effect I wanted.

And this is the finished result.............

Each pumpkin has three coats of decoupage sealer,. I added fake leaves and two twig chunks for stems. I think I'm going to stain the stems with a brown/green antique stain as they blend too much with the leaves.
Working with that jar of decoupage sealer was so much fun that I tried my hand at a project in Woman's Day magazine. You'll find the instructions here. I didn't get the best photo of my project but here it is finished and then with candle lit. I want to make more of these but the only jar I had was tall and so I added the wreath of leaves just for fun. These were so easy. I figure I can save jars between now and next October and make up plenty for a Halloween party!

So, with some finished decorations, I added them to my dining room table yesterday when our Bible Study group met at my house. I set out some of my miniature gift boxes on the Halloween table runner that I made last year from Pat Sloan's pattern (it can be found here). I loved how my new decoupaged pumpkins looked on the tablerunner!

I've shared my miniature gift boxes in past posts but here are some quick shots of the creative little projects that I made in the 1990's. Every item in each display is handmade.

I created the little pumpkins, caramel apples, donuts and candies, ghosts and witches from FIMO or Sculpey clay. Tiny wrapped candy bars were created by cutting little pics of candy bars from store coupons.



 I drew the designs for the little Trick or Treat bags and filled them with the tiny candies.

 And to top off all the Halloween themed decorations, there was this treat that I baked........

It's fresh out of the oven in the photo above. You can find the recipe here. I followed the recipe almost exactly. Almost.........I added some Kraft Karamel bits and instead of walnuts, I added pecans. And then I drizzled frosting on top...........

Everybody said it was soooooooo good. And it really was! It was quick and easy and if you print out the recipe right now, get out the ingredients and start mixing, you can be eating a piece of this in, oh......about an hour and a half. LOL!
I want to say thank you to all of you for the lovely comments following my post on my friend, Cindy. Her husband, Stephen, commented that she would have loved reading the post.  Thanks to all of you that took the time to read that post and every one of my posts which are often long and chatty but true to life. Have a greeeaaattt Wednesday!
Sandi