Glitter Pumpkins
DISCLAIMER: This project involves glitter, which can get a little messy!!
I took a trip to the dollar store the other day and found these cute plain pumpkins! I had seen a pin on Pinterest about decorating pumpkins with paint and glitter, so I bought a few!! I found the orange glitter one first, which also helped give me some inspiration.
Here are the supplies that you will need for this project!
~Styrofoam pumpkins
~ paint (I got black and white)
~ Foam Paint brush
~ Small paint brush (doesn't have to be fancy)
~ Glitter (I got silver and gold)
~ Mod Podge
The picture above shows the main color of each of the pumpkins.
I started by cutting off the tags of each pumpkin. I realized later after painting them that the stems can actually be removed. So I would suggest removing the stems first so that you don't get paint all over them like i did. ;)
When you are removing the stems, make sure to pull on them gently. The picture below shows the pumpkin with the stem removed before I painted it.
Next, You will want to paint the pumpkin! I bought Matte Acrylic Paint that is the Apple Barrel Brand from Walmart.
I started painting from top to bottom. Make sure to use the same brush strokes all throughout. This helps the paint to look more uniform as it drys.
I painted the top and sides of the pumpkin. I realized later that I didn't paint the bottom, which is totally fine if you choose to do the same. No one sees the bottom anyways right?
Like I said earlier, I did paint two coats on the pumpkins. I let each coat dry before applying another coat and then the glitter.
Next, I got out my glitter and Mod Podge. (This is really where the project starts to get messy! Don't worry though, I have some tips to help!)
Do this on your table! I even had thought about doing it outside, because the glitter got everywhere no matter how careful i was... I still was finding glitter on me and around my house a few days after.
I wanted my big pumpkin to have gold glitter on the top half of it. So I got some tape and tapped around the pumpkin to mark where I wanted the glitter to go.
Once it was tapped, I put a pretty decent layer of mod podge on with a foam brush.
This next part got really messy. I got a bowl and started sprinkling the glitter onto the pumpkin. I couldn't think of an easier way to make it work. I ended up using a funnel, after all was said and done, and attempted to dump / pour the glitter from the bowl back into the container. It kinda worked... But also make a little bit more of a mess...
Once I got as much glitter as I could on the pumpkin I took off the tape to help it dry.
Next I started on the other pumpkins.
After some experimenting I found that the following process worked really good for more details and design.
Using the smaller paint brush, dip into the mod podge or glue first. Next, dip the brush into the glitter. I actually put it straight into the container! Finally "Paint" your design on the pumpkin.
that process worked great! It was more tedious, but I was able to keep things more clean than like I did for the big pumpkin.
One thing I found out pretty quick was after the glue dried. Some places still needed more glitter. So I just repeated the process until there were no holes and empty spaces.
The final part of this project was covering some of the stems with glitter. I loved how this part turned out. Some of the stems looked kinda nasty, so I decided to try putting the glitter on. Using the small paint brush, I "painted" mod podge onto the stem. Then I dipped the glue covered stem into the glitter. The containers my glitter came in were the perfect size for this.
The total cost for this project was about $15 !
I loved how cute these pumpkins turned out! I enjoy having them as a centerpiece for my table.
~Jessica
CLEANING TIPS AND TRICKS:
Here are some of the tricks that I learned about cleaning up glitter!
Your Vacuum is your best friend. I used the hose on the table, on the chairs, on the floor, on me, Pretty much everywhere.
If you used a bowl, just rinse it out!
Damp wash cloths work pretty good with getting the glitter that the vacuum didn't pick up.
You may find glitter for a while.... (Sorry!)
