My Steampunk Jack-O-Lantern!

Or, ok, let's just go ahead and call it a Steampunkin. :)

 

I had a lot of ideas for this guy, so nailing down the design was definitely the hardest part. If I'd known what I wanted to begin with, I probably could have finished in an afternoon, instead of taking over a week. o.0

(I really vacillated between painting it copper & leaving the pumpkin "natural." I'm happy with it this way, but tempted to grab another small pumpkin and go full on metallic. :D)

My only expense was the pumpkin itself - a $15 "Funkin" - and a single sheet of craft foam. Everything else is bits and pieces I had on hand.

The jaw and tube flange are made with craft foam, silver rub n' buff, and "bead in a bottle" paint for the rivets:

The plastic tubing is for holding computer wires (there's a split down the back), from a big roll I found in the clearance section at Ikea for a dollar.

The monocle is a discard from my original goggles tutorial, but you could easily substitute a jar lid or piece of PVC pipe:

The straps are more craft foam, held in place with furniture tacks.

The last thing I added ended up being one of my favorites: a cut-away section with exposed gears:

 

The gears are the same thin foil gears I use on just about everything, which my friend Sharyn makes in her die-cutting machine. (Love ya, Sharyn!)

I originally planned to have a PVC "chimney" on there, too, but the proportions were off so I scrapped it. John liked it, though, and since he took a cool photo I GUESS I'll go ahead and post it:

It's all wrong, though, right? Yep, I stand by my decision to remove the chimney. (But that photo on the right is awesome. Hey John, sweetie, you wanna do all my project photos? [Bambi eyes])

 Now, are you ready... for the magic? 

HIT THE LIGHTS!

Sha-POW!

And check out the gear cut-outs on the side!

Aw yeeeeah. I am DIGGING those gear silhouettes.

And I'm completely in love with my pumpkin light, you guys. It's the same one I had last year, which changes colors in alternating flashes & slow fades. I found it at one of those seasonal Halloween Superstore places for about $10.

I also added a glow bracelet (left over from my poison apple tutorial) inside the tubing, which works surprisingly well.

Here's a video of it all in action - turn off your sound, unless you want to hear my wall clock ticking away:

But wait, WE'RE STILL NOT DONE. I have one more trick up my, uh, pumpkin.

Did you wonder why I carved the mouth so big? And why the whole thing is sitting on that black plastic base? There's a reason! And here it is:

BUBBLES!!

Here's how we did it:

I've had this $10 bubble gun for ages, figuring I'd use it for something steamy eventually. John built a wooden turn rod that, when twisted, presses the trigger. The rod above the trigger-pusher goes through the gun's housing for stability. Then we topped off the turn rod with an old faucet handle.

Initially the pumpkin's mouth was angled down a little too far, so the bubbles kept popping on the jaw. To prop it up, John cut off most of an old plastic bucket to form a ring. This gives a nice stable bottom for the gun, and also lets us angle the pumpkin any way we like. (The bubble gun is easily removable, btw, which is nice.)

The bubble feature would be WAY cooler if it were motion-activated, of course, but we don't have those skills just yet. It's fun to have the option of a little interactive surprise, though, and I think the neighborhood kids will like it come Halloween night!

Hope you liked my Steampunkin, everyone! And thanks to those of you who suggested I make one in the first place over on the Epbot FB page; I really had fun with this guy, and couldn't be happier with how he turned out!

*****

Come see ALL of my craft projects on one page, right here!