Once upon a time, I liked the idea of carving pumpkins. And then I actually carved some pumpkins. The cutting, slicing, pulling out “the guts,” trying to carve a design that looks like something. Anything?! At some point I dramatically declared that I would “never carve another pumpkin!” But! I don’t like to be left out of the Halloween decorating fun, so over the years I’ve found some easy ways to decorate them without scary metal tools!
If you love pumpkins (who doesn’t?!) but aren’t a huge fan of all the carving, these Halloween DIY projects are for you. Yes – I have a thing for white pumpkins – mostly because orange is one of my least favorite colors! And I typically use fake pumpkins for projects like these, so they will last forever and ever. But you could totally do all three of these DIY projects with real ones if that’s how you roll.
1. Thumbtack Pumpkin
Supplies:
– Pumpkin
-Thumbtacks
Yep. That’s it! Two supplies. All you do is push the tacks into the pumpkin in any pattern you like. I chose an “A” for Almeida!
2. Silhouette Pumpkin
Supplies:
-Pumpkin
-Printed silhouette
-Scissors
–Mod Podge in matte finish
Umm… can you say ONLY child? Yes, Kingston’s adorable profile even adorns our Halloween decor. I know, I know.
Moving on.
1. Have your subject stand in front of a solid color wall. And take a profile picture.
2. Open the picture in Photoshop. Using the ‘Magic Wand’ tool, select the background (the wall in your picture). Choose ‘Edit’ – ‘Cut’ to delete the background.
3. Now go to ‘Image’ – ‘Adjustments’ – ‘Desaturate’. This removes all the color from the image.
4. And finish up with ‘Adjustments’ – ‘Brightness/Contrast.’ Lower the brightness and increase the contrast until your image starts looking like a silhouette.
5. Print your cute silhouette and cut it out carefully.
6. Using Mod Podge, glue the image to a pumpkin. I actually used shiny finish, but you can see where the shiny brush strokes are. If I do it again, I’ll definitely use matte.
7. Sit back and admire your fab work! Kingston likes to sit in front of the pumpkin and stare at it. He’s so vain.
3. Ombre Pumpkin
Supplies:
-Pumpkin
-Paint brush
-Paint (a fun color and white)
-A small piece of material (I used a scrap from an old t-shirt)
1. Mix your three colors. I used bright turquoise for the top, then mixed some white with it for the middle color, and added a little more white for the bottom color.
2. Starting from the top of the pumpkin, paint the darkest color about 1/4 down the pumpkin..
3. Quickly paint on the middle color. We aren’t going for perfection here! Ombre typically has an uneven finish. Then finish with the lightest color on the bottom.
4. Before the paint has time to dry, use the t-shirt scrap to dab at the lines where the paint colors meet. The goal is the blend it, so there aren’t any harsh lines.
That’s it! You’re finished. Now go set out some candy corn. After you eat half of it. 🙂
PS – You can see some of our Halloween decor from last year here.