Wednesday 17 October 2012


Halloween is just around the corner and it's a great opportunity to get creative for the kids and have a bit of fun.The Ellison Europe building is near an old engineering factory and on my way back to my car at night I passed a bunch of rusty washers littering the car park which gave me an idea.....

I thought I would take a pumpkin die and give it the old Steampunk treatment. The die used is Movers & Shapers (Base) Pumpkin Jack by Tim Holtz (657663) you can get some wicked magnetic Movers & Shapers dies to go with this too. and I used an embossing folder from the Pattern & Stitches Set by Tim Holtz (657198).

It may look a little creepy for some tastes but kids love this kind of thing, who am I to argue?

You will also need some rusty old washers, craft wire, assorted distress inks and a stapler.

I started by die cutting the pumpkin and stalk from heavy weight ivory card before scrunching it into a tight ball and flattening it again. Next, I used my ink applicator to apply Mustard Seed Distress Ink followed by a few other favourites like Rusty Hinge, Crushed Olive and Spiced Marmalade before going around the edges with Walnut Stain.


I took two washers and placed them on the Pumpkin before drawing around the inside and cutting out the circles with a craft knife. next I attached them to the pumpkin using beading wire threaded around each washer, the more random and haphazard the better to be honest. Next I cut a length of ivory card and distressed with the lighter inks before distressing the edges with a scissors blade before de-bossing the stitched effect using the embossing folder. Finally I applied the darker inks to bring out the detail.
I gave the stalk the same treatment but heavy on the Crushed Olive Distress ink and attached both stalk and mouth using a stapler.
You can now use this on a layout, as a tag or to decorate a Halloween favour bag, I used mine attached to a simple,unadorned brown lunch bag. To attach it I made my own Barbed wire using medium weight craft wire I do hope you like the end result.

1 comment:

  1. Clever! The textures and colors are very nice.

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