Halloween Archives - Simple Crafts

Halloween Fimo Cat Tutorial.

October 6, 2013 by Merry Leave a Comment

It’s been such a long time since I did any polymer clay work that all my talent seemed to have deserted me when I sat down to make a start on this little chap. In fact it took nearly a week and endless prototypes before I started to feel like I was finding my fingers with it again. In the end though, I’m rather pleased with this little chap. He’s a great Halloween Cat and easy to make with some patience too.

I started with the orange one (who I think I probably like the character of the best really) and made the brown one to photograph a tutorial. We had a lot of fun together and hopefully these fairly brief photo instructions will help you too.

As usual, all my Fimo came from our shop CraftMerrily. We are always very pleased to welcome new customers and grateful for their purchases!

1. First, whizz up your chosen colours into a blend that feel furry to you and divide into balls for head, body, neck, legs and tail. I made my leg balls roughly twice the size I needed them here, so scale back a bit there!

2. Make the body a bit egg shaped and then put a flattened neck ball on top. I added a flat disk of cream to his tummy for a splash of colour.

3. Mould the ear points out a bit (and they need to go through a hat so make them slightly too large. I use a pointy tool to make ear dimples; if you fancy it you can fill them with a small pear drop shape of a different colour. Push your thumbs into the sides to make eye sockets and then press a round tool in to those sockets to make the eye ball hole.

(Note: at this point the head can get a bit flat; you get a better cat face if you pause to round it up again a little, especially under the nose. My tutorial attempt went a bit flat and teddy like.)

4. Two flat pancakes of colour go into the eye sockets. I like translucent Fimo for this. I use a knitting need to make hole in that and then push two beads in for pupils.

5. Create the small pieces shown in the middle right picture and attach them to the face. How these are placed gives character and expression, so experiment.

6. I use a knitting needle to give furry blending detail now. Blend the eye lids, soften the ears, add fur to his face and blend the triple nose piece to the face. Add whisker dots to the cream and nostrils to the black nose.

7. Attach him to his neck and blend those 3 pieces together. I know cats don’t have very obvious necks but it just lengthens his figure a bit. Add furry detail across the body front, especially blending the tummy patch if you’ve made one.

8. Getting the arms and legs right is tricky. Remember to give elbows (no one has joint free limbs, it just looks wrong) and experiment with paws. Chunky is good, delicate gives a different look (more female). Add three dents to the paws for claws/footpads.

9. With the back legs, a change in angle helps the feet look real. Model the shape in the bottom right picture and add a detail by scoring a line around the ‘ankle’ and then pressing the leg and foot together again. It makes it look more defined. Add creases at the next joint. Make the side attaching to the body flat and the outer side more rounded. You can see this better in the top picture below.

10. Attach the limbs and position to give the attitude you like. Once the look and feel right, blend the hips and shoulders on to the main body so the join isn’t obvious. Don’t blend too far down or he will look as if his legs are stuck to his body in a weird body lock spell. Add furry detail to his limbs and his back.

11. Mould a tail in a shape that suits him. Make one end thick and flat and then sit him on it and blend as before. Looks better than being stuck to the back and is stronger too.

12. His wizard hat is just moulded from a ball of black Fimo. It needs two holes in the brim for his ears but otherwise can be a floppy or perky as you like. This one has a beaten up hat but I think he’s a fairly old wizard cat 🙂

As usual, I created a Pinterest board to inspire me. You might like some of these Cat Crafts too.

Pumpkin Glow Pot

October 25, 2012 by Merry Leave a Comment

Here is a quick and fun way to use up the strips of crochet you accumulate when a child is learning that craft.My 10 year old actually taught me to crochet, but is still happiest turning out long chains. I got her to do a long piece in bright orange acrylic wool for me, so we could make a pumpkin pot using some glass baby food jars we have stashed.

As you can see, he turned out really well. It’s so simple; one long chain of yarn, crocheted in orange. Then paint a jar in tacky glue and wind the crochet around the jar. We did felt shapes for eyes and nose and mouth in yellow, but I think for a quirky effect, we might replace them with black tomorrow. The felt got glued on too.

For a bit of fun, Amelie covered the lid of the jar in green fimo to give him a top. She decided it turns him into a French pumpkin! If you use an electric tea light for the glow effect, you’ll be able to leave this lid on while he’s ‘alight’ – obviously with a flame tea light, the lid will make him go out though!

For the record, we put a flame tea light in. The yarn is synthetic and can’t burn easily. I lit it once the candle was inside (grown up job!) but you could flame proof the yarn if you wished. Be careful – and don’t do anything silly with it. We aren’t responsible for anything daft you do while making or lighting this craft!

Hama Bead Ghost Pot

October 24, 2012 by Merry Leave a Comment

Finding new things to do with a hama bead creation is always a challenge worth taking on; I particularly like 3D items, especially if they are useful. This particular ghost pattern, converted into a pot for holding glowsticks, possibly pushes the boundaries of actually being useful, but it is fun!

Maddy made up these patterns; while I tend to go for interlocking designs, she decided she would stitch them together. I love the way this looks; it gives it a really different finish and perfect for a spooky pot!

It’s a very simple set of patterns, all made in green glow in the dark hama beads. Once made and ironed on one side, Maddy stitched them together in a square. There are two designs of ghost and they alternate around the square base.

Once stitched, a painted toilet roll tube went down the middle to support the ghosts. We actually covered ours with black card for speed, but felt or paint would work better. It’s now a perfect storage pot for all those glowsticks you have hanging around!

One thing that occurred to me afterwards was that if the tips of the hands and the bottom row of the ghost were done in white, rather than glow, they will look like they are floating when in the dark. I think that would be an extra good spooky effect that wouldn’t alter the look of them when the light was on.

Here are the printable patterns for the pot. We really hope yoooooooooooou have plenty of fun with it!

For a spooky graveyard scene in hama beads, visit BeadMerrily for a brand new pattern set.

Hama Bead Owl Family

October 21, 2012 by Merry 182 Comments

Owls are fairly traditional Halloween fare but I must admit I’ve got a bit of an obsession with them in general (hooooooo… hasn’t?) and I’ve been collecting them on my owl board on Pinterest for quite a while. All the cute little chaps on there inspired me to have a go at some Hama Bead patterns in bright colours and these are the results.

I’ve got a bit of a soft spot for the one with his wings up and I think I might tweak the mummy owl a bit at some point but over all I was quite happy with them. They definitely show a few different owlish attitudes 😉

I’ve drawn up the patterns for them which is free to download for this site by right clicking and saving. The patterns are all worked on a large Hama Bead Hexagon board and can be done in any colours you like. I’ve chosen bright dark colours accented with their pastel conterpart and then white and cream tummies (I altered mummy a bit when I created her pattern) but you could do browns, whites and blacks for more realistic owls.

Here’s a small version of all the patterns I’ve created if you can work from that and just want one quick set to print off. Otherwise, full sized versions are below.

I’d love to see what you make with these; do leave me a comment and a link if you try them out and feel free to share them on the internet via Pinterest etc 🙂

Halloween Finger Puppets in Felt – Tricky Set

October 20, 2012 by Merry Leave a Comment

Having done our finger puppets last week in a nice easy style, Maddy decided to take it a step further and make a more complicated bunch. The result is a truly monstrous bunch of felt finger puppets that I think you will really love!

This would be a tricky bunch to describe step by step. We’ve done a pattern guide sheet but it was drawn after the event (I will redo it at some point) and so although it is a good guide, you will need to tweak some sizes and shapes a little possibly. However, in a nutshell….

Skeleton is two white pieces and the pattern stitched on in black thread.

Witch is a body with a face stitched on (you could glue) and hat stitched on top. The cape was actually pieces sewn on to the sides and back fbut we’ve simplified it into a single cape.

The devil can be made by sewing or stitching the face on but sewing will work better. The horns can be done as two triangles but Maddy did a crescent and stitched it behind the face. The tail and trident are blanket stitched and then attached.

Maddy did Frankie’s head in two parts with a stitched detail scar and blanket stitch around the face to give character. The cape is like Dracula’s but a little smaller.

The Vampire has a stitched collar and cape in 3 pieces. You could adapt the witches cape to work though.

Click here Halloween puppet patterns.

Halloween Finger Puppets in Felt – Easy Set

October 15, 2012 by Merry 14 Comments

I got a little one to one time with my 8 year old the other day and she wanted to do some sewing. Since I was typing up a witch tutorial at the time but wanted to facilitate, I helped her create some easy Halloween finger puppets. The designs and ideas were really all her own, barring the ghoul which I felt compelled to make too 😉 All I did was cut out her designs and help her with some of the fiddly face bits but otherwise she made them and did all the stitching.

Each puppet is made from two pieces of felt stitched together. The ears are folded over on the mouse to give a bat look to them but otherwise the spider legs, pumpkin stalk and owl wings are stitched between the main body layers as you go round. The bat wings are stuck on the back and the face pieces are stuck on the front.

There is a story behind the bat. His body was originally a mouse and he was re-purposed after that project ended due to mouse fatigue. His wings are one set of butterfly wings (which can be printed here) which were also left over. Obviously you could just make your own wings to be more bat like but we rather liked the mouse-a-fly.

The Halloween finger puppet patterns can be downloaded and printed here except for the faces because frankly, I think you should make those up yourself! 😉

We’ve got a more complicated set of puppets under construction too, so hopefully they’ll be available soon!

A Titchy Fimo Clay Witch.

October 14, 2012 by Merry 2 Comments

Halloween preparation is firmly underway in this house; with 5 costumes to get ready we always need plenty of preparation time. So thoughts are turning to witches and spooky things and after running a workshop with some kids this week, I wanted another go at making a polymer clay witch of my own.

I was really pleased with how she turned out and so very glad I took photos as I went along. So here is a proper tutorial. She really wasn’t hard to do at all; all the kids (aged 8-12) managed her really well. You need black, flesh, hair coloured and green polymer clay (my preference here is Fimo Soft for the black and colours and Fimo Classic for the Flesh) plus a wadge of scrap clay. If you don’t have that, you can use any colour or roll up a tight ball of tin foil and work around that.

First make the scrap into a tube, slightly wider and rounded at each wand. I made a strip of clay in black and blended it around the bottom and underneath to give her some knickers. The skirt is flared and you don’t want scrap clay showing.

The skirt is a big ball of black, flattened into a rough circle. Make sure you don’t pull any bits too thin, but don’t worry about making it too perfect. Drape it over the scrap and arrange it into folds. It can kick and flare a bit and will give nice movement too her dress.

The arms are two big sausages. This is a cartoon witch so proportion not important. Stumpy and chubby is cute.

Bend the arms into two right angles in opposite directions. People make the mistake of making arms with curved elbows – make sure she has points!

Next flatten her upper arms so the outside edge is rounded and the underside is flat. Dig your nail, or a tool, into the elbow creases to give the impression of folds in the fabric.

For the sleeve cuffs, I gently press my thumb into the back of the sausage and form a thinner piece for the hands to sit into. The side that isn’t there will be up against her body and will look like her fabric is pushed away from her hands.

Now press the arms lightly to the body and arrange to suit the attitude you want.

I flattened a small ball into a circle and dug my nail into the edge for a frill and gave her a lacy collar. She’s shaping up to be a friendly witch.

The hat is a cone; gently pull out the brim from the fat end of the cone and then give the top a cheeky twist. I twisted a sausage of fimo and put a cord around the brim and I always dig my thumb knuckle into the underneath in the middle. This gives the hat some realism on her head as the head sits in it rather than the hat perching on top of her hair.

The cauldron is waste clay covered in a circle of black which is then blended till its flat and trimmed at the top with a knife or tool. I also made a thin sausage of clay to be a brim and 3 balls for feet. Two small bits of sausage make handles, one of which covers the join. (See below).

Now wash and scrub your hands. That black gets everywhere. I always wash then uses a small ball of flesh or white had play with it in my hands a while to get rid of bits of black that spoil the next stage. Baby wipes are also excellent.

Faces. I hate faces. I tend to keep them simple or even blank if I’m doing arty. So here goes. Roll a ball of flesh (I favour Fimo Classic) and then make two small holes for eyes. I put little beads in to the holes, but two small balls of black fimo work too. Just keep them the same size or they look odd! I carved eyebrows and mouth in with a small blunt tool and the nose is a triangle stuck on. It’s big, but she is a witch! Nostrils underneath not on top – she’s not a pig!

For hands on a simple model I just make two balls of flesh clay and press for lines into them. It’s an impression of a hand, not a hand.

For a model with a hat, a half cocktail stick is an invaluable assistance to not becoming headless, which would be a whole different Halloween model!

Hair. There are loads of ways to do this as you can see at the bottom. One version is strings of clay and the other is the shaped pancake which you can see above. I used my nail to make a texture round the edge and a tool to rough up the top. No need to be too careful, it will mostly be under her hat.

Put her together with her hat on and she’s ready. All that’s left to do is mix up some scrap green and blues, make little balls of it and get that cauldron bubbling! Oh and press some button shapes into her front. I did that with a pointy tool.

As you can see from this photo, the weight of her head pulled her neck back a bit while she was cooking. Luckily, thanks to the cocktail stick, I can correct this by lifting it off and dropping a ball of black over the stick. The head will drop back in place and squish down on a new supportive collar and I will know better next time!

More Halloween ideas on Pinterest!

Crafty Bottle Cat

October 11, 2012 by Merry Leave a Comment

This gorgeous creature was made by Maddy after she was inspired by the shape of a beer bottle left on the side one morning. He reminds me of Carwash from Willow the Wisp, but Maddy didn’t know the character so I think it is co-incidence.

This cat would make a great Halloween cat, though you might want to make him black in that case, and was lovely and easy to do.

First Maddy balanced a polystyrene ball on top of the beer bottle and glued it down on the neck. Once that was dry, she used PVA glue to stick pieces of red tissue to cover the bottle and the ball until all of it was covered. Then it was left to dry for a day or two, with a covering of PVA glue painted on top of all the paper bits to give it a glossy finish.

Maddy made some body parts from polymer clay; a nose, tail, paws, front legs and ears. Once the main body was dry, these were glued on to him with tacky glue and his features added with permanent black marker.

I think he’s purrrrrrrr….fect! 😉

Halloween Pom Pom Characters

October 4, 2012 by Merry 2 Comments

Last year we had great fun dressing up our window with a combination of gel pens and Halloween Pom Pom creatures. They stayed up nearly till it was time to get festive in fact, since they cheered up the greyness of autumn pretty well.

Pom Pom creatures are great fun at any time but lend themselves particularly well to Halloween. The spider was made by pushing 4 long black pipecleaners through the middle before it was tied off and then some googly, bloodshot eyes were stuck on with tacky glue. By buying cheap acrylic yarn, these are super cost effective and we had several hanging outside the door too. The witch was a bit more complicated; her arm was a long pipe learner glued under her green head (would have been better with small green pompon hands think!) and her nose glued on while she took a quick lie down. Maddy made her hat from fun foam sheets; the cone needed to be held while the glue stuck firmly though.

I thoughts the skeleton had huge appeal; a mostly pipecleaner body with a great big head, eyes and foam mouth.

The vampire bat had foam triangular wings, again glued on with tacky glue, foam teeth and a Pom Pom head and body. He reminds me of the muskrat in the moomin stories.

What better way to do a pumpkin… so much carving saved! 😉

These Pom Pom Halloween characters first featured on our family blog. The window art was drawn with gel pens from our shop.

This craft kicks off a couple of weeks of Halloween crafting on Simple Crafts. Lots of brand new and original crafting being bubble bubbled as we speak 🙂 (but we didn’t think we could improve upon this little bunch of chaps!)