This creepy Halloween monster was inspired by a shopping trip with my youngest daughter. Right at the entrance way of one of our favorite home decorating stores were two gigantic monsters, with arms outstretched, and red glowing eyes. "AWWWWESOME!" my daughter exclaimed. She was hooked. "Oh mom, pul-ease can we get one?" One raised momma eyebrow was enough of an answer. Then I got to thinking - hey - perhaps we could make one using stuff we already had at home. "DO instead of BUY" in action - with a lot of "SHOPPING at home FIRST" thrown in. My kind of project! My daughter wasn't sure, but she was game to try. Oh - and that monster in the store? CHA CHING CHA CHING! He had a $149.99 price tag on him!
Well, I have to say - my little one succeeded. She created a ghoul for Halloween that exceeded her expectations. In fact this thing is so creepy I have to issue a WARNING to all of you who plan on building your own. DO NOT set this monster up just inside your front entrance. Because, when you head into the kitchen during the middle of the night for a glass of water, you will have forgotten the monster is there... and yes, you will wake up the entire house when you scream! (Please don't ask me how I know this - big sigh!)
Part 1: Making the Head: Here's what we used:
One big bowl - we used my middle daughter's bread making bowl (she spied this thing at a garage sale for $1.00 and has used it many times since).
- tin foil - my youngest asked her teacher about paper mache. Her teacher recommended lining the outside of the bowl with tinfoil so that the paper mache wouldn't stick to the bowl. Her sister liked this idea!
- Newspaper - torn into strips
- Tape
- Flour
- Salt
- Water
- A place to get messy.
Use tinfoil to shape out some eyebrows, ears, the nose, cheekbones, lips, chin, forhead bumps, scars, wrinkles, warts, etc. Then tape them in place over top of the tinfoil on the bowl.
And now for the fun part! Mix up a batch of paper mache gloop! My daughter mixed up one part flour to two parts water (start with 1 cup flour, 2 cups water). Her teacher recommended adding a teaspoon of salt the mixture to prevent mold from growing on her monster.
Using the strips of newspaper dipped into the flour goop, cover the entire face of the monster - including over the eyebrows, the nose, lips and whatever other "things" you taped on the tinfoil.
After covering with the first layer of paper mache, we let the head dry completely overnight. Then afterschool, for the next three days, my daughter added another layer. She wanted to ensure the face would be strong enough without the bowl underneath (as well, her older sister was hinting strongly that she would like her bowl back!). Don't worry about any lumps, bumps, and wrinkles on the head - these look great after they are painted (ghoul wrinkles LOL).
For the last layer, my daughter used white paper instead of newspaper. She figured it would make it easier to paint. I think this is optional, most paints cover newpaper. However, she was so excited about this project, I wasn't going to argue - white paper it was!
Part 2: Painting the Head
This is my favorite part. It was hard to let go and just let my daughter do her thing. We did a little "Shopping at home First" and discovered my box of acrylics in the craft stash (water color would work just as well). After literally blowing the dust off the box, I decided my daughter may as well experience how wonderful this paint is to use (I hadn't used it myself in a long time). She had a blast! Since we knew that we would be using floodlights to light up her ghoul, the painting could be very creative. What she painted on the face was going to look entirely different with the red and yellow floodlights (they are the only ones we have right now, and I refuse to BUY new ones until they burn out - they have lasted over 10 years LOL).
Let your artist be creative (my daughter changed her mind a few times - and repainted parts of her ghoul). The paint does not have to be perfect. Greys, greens, browns, yellows, and other gruesome color combinations look fantastic on the ghoul. The creepier, the better. Here's a hint - make sure you finish the painting before you assemble the monster. My daughter was wanting me to paint the teeth, which I hadn't noticed until after the monster was standing up. So I painted teeth afterwords - complete with yellow spots and gum disease (at least that was my excuse for the shaky paint job LOL). Have fun with this! There are no mistakes!
A couple hints, leave the whites of the eyes white - and use dark browns, or blacks, and some red to outline the eyes - this makes it creepier. Parts that stick out like the nose, cheekbones, forehead wrinkles, chin, etc - paint them lighter colors so they highlight with the flood lights. She added lots of darks to create a very ghoulish-looking critter.
This is our ghoul under regular lights.
And this is our ghoul with the lights turned off, the yellow and red flood lights turned on (from below), and his teeth painted in. My daughter also painted a wart on his nose.
Because the flood lights are shining from below, our monster has some interesting shadows in his eyes and above his lips. It added to the character. My daughter also added a few extra splashes of red and yellow paint - which shows up better under the floodlights.
Part 3: Putting the Ghoul Together
My husband helped with this part. First off, remove the head from the bowl. The tin foil should make this very easy to do. Then return the bowl to the sister who is anxiously awaiting its undamaged return.
Then start shopping - AT HOME FIRST! We used a mic stand for the "body" of the ghoul. The horizontal part of the stand formed the shoulders, while the vertical part formed the spine and legs. You could use scrap wood, brooms, an apple box, a music stand, a lamp pole, etc for your ghoul's body. Check out the house, basement, shed, and garage - remember, the ghoul is temporary - you only need to "borrow" his body parts for a week or so.
Then we duct-taped some pieces of wood for arms onto the mic stand. At the ends of his arms, we tied a pair of my husband's black ski gloves as hands.
Attaching the head to the body took a little more "Shopping." My husband headed into the laundry room and came up with a duster stick. One end was duct taped into the back of the head, and the other end was taped to the mic stand. Voila - one ghoul skeleton!
As for clothes, we have a stash of fabrics in the kid's costume bucket. This includes several pieces of black cloth. You could use anything - even old clothes, a white sheet, blue sheet, etc to "dress" your ghoul. Since we didn't want to worry about hair or a hat, we simply draped a piece of cloth over the head. I purchased this cloth many years ago at a fabric store clear-out. The cobwebs and spiders are perfect. (Oh - and here's an idea - the actual ghoul that we saw in the store had fun-fur on his eyebrows and hairline - that would be easy to add).
The Finishing Touch
Remember to take pictures! Our ghoul will be moved from the front hall out onto the porch on Halloween. We're expecting rain, so we don't want to put him out until necessary. Fortunately, the porch should keep him sheltered. Once Halloween is over, his "borrowed" parts will be returned and my daughter can decide what she wants to do with his head. All in all, this project was a hoot to do! It didn't cost us a dime - we had everything in our home already. Somebody paid $149.99 for the monster in the store - they will never know how priceless the beast really could have been!
Let your kids DO! You'll be amazed by what they can accomplish. The cool thing is, they learn that not everything they see in a store actually has to come from a store. DO instead of BUY!
Happy Halloween everyone!
