Tuesday, October 8, 2019

Halloween DIY: It's The Stay Puft Pumpkin Man!

I've seen 2 or 3 Stay Puft pumpkins floating around online, and knew THIS was my year to finally make my own. My only concern was spending a small fortune on fake pumpkins, since lets face it, those things are PRICEY.

John and I went pumpkin bargain hunting, and eventually found everything we needed at Walmart for about $30. So not super cheap, but worth it if you're a big Ghostbusters fan like me.

Here's what you'll need to collect from the Walmart pumpkin aisle:

 
 The largest pumpkin is $10, the medium is $5, and the 8 small ones are $1 each. Then there's a bag of mini pumpkins for $3. We also bought a few sheets of colored felt.

You'll also need some long wooden skewers (yes, the kind you roast marshmallows on! Appropriate, yes?), white spray paint, hot glue, a little stuffing for the hat, and some craft paint. 

I also used a little stretchy white fabric for the hat, but you can use white felt instead.

In two nights we'd turned our pumpkin pile into the world's most huggable Halloween decoration:

 
LOOK HOW CUTE. My sweet marshmallow boy!! 

Isn't he adorable? Every time I pick him up I have to hug him, haha.


Once you have all the right pumpkin sizes, putting Stay Puft together is pretty simple:


First figure out how you want to stack his arms and legs.

Then skewer the smaller pumpkins on your wooden sticks, and jam them into the body. For extra strength - and to prevent them from spinning - add a dab of hot glue between each pumpkin.

Put the "hands" & "feet" on just partway, so the skewer doesn't poke through the opposite side.

Now, I hate sewing, so I cheated with the hat. All I did was wrap a square of white fabric around a little stuffing, tie it shut with string, and trim off the excess fabric:

Boom. A hat.

Well, not quite; it still needs the brim. For that I covered a strip of cardboard with blue felt: 


... and twisted the brim into a circle, hot-gluing it shut. 

Finally I hot-glued the brim in place around my white fabric pouch.

NOW it's a hat.

I used the rest of my blue felt - and a little red - to make his little sailor collar:

 

It's easiest to put the collar UNDER the head instead of around it, so don't glue the head on until the very end, after everything is painted.

Final mock-up before painting:

I used my Cricut to make the letters on his hat, but you could paint those on with fabric paint - which would actually be sturdier, since these vinyl ones can be peeled off. If you're lazy like me and have a Cricut, though, then here's the template to cut your own:




 I also cut vinyl strips for the white outline on his collar. 
(Does my crafting laziness KNOW NO BOUNDS? No. No, it does not.)

The next night we spray-painted the whole thing flat white, making sure to keep the head separate from the body.

Once the paint was dry, I hot-glued on the collar and then the head:

Finally I painted on his face, and glued on his hat.

DONE.
Ta-daa! We've been displaying him in our kitchen window.

But wait! I decided his open arms looked empty, so I sketched a little Slimer:


Which John turned into a paper chain for our Cricut to cut:
 

It's big, so it's cut in two pieces. 

Here's the template we made, in case you'd like to make your own!

(Right-click to embiggen, then save to your desktop.)


I glued two of the hands together to form a longer chain:

I also outlined the edges with a Sharpie to give him more definition.

I attached the paper chain to Stay Puft's hands with poster tack, so I can easily remove it if I think of something more fun for him to hold. (He'd be adorable holding a party banner with someone's name, or even just "Happy Halloween!")

 And NOW he's done!

I hope he makes you smile as much as I am right now. :D

I also hope this inspires some of my fellow Ghostheads out there to make their own Puft-kins!

Stay tuned for more Ghostbusters Halloween builds this month, since we're planning to BUST OUT all our outdoor decorations this year. (Just as soon as I get over this head cold, darn it.)

*****

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17 comments:

  1. I love this so much, it's adorable!! I'm working on a pumpkin craft myself, but black and glittery - with horns! I'll show you on Instagram when I'm done 😃

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  2. Ack! The cuteness! I can't handle it!

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  3. He is so cute! You guys are so talented.

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  4. This is just too too cute!!!

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  5. He is ridiculously adorable!!

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  6. Your creativity and talent know no bounds! Kudos for an amazing piece of art!

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  7. So cute! I like your heart-shaped sunglasses too, Jen!

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  8. i wonder what it would look like if you turned a pumpkin upside-down and used that for the white part of the hat... or if that even makes sense...

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    1. Oooh, I hadn't thought of that! I think it would work, yes!

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  9. "Bust out" your decorations, huh? I hope that bustin' makes you feel good. :D

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  10. I know what I'm doing tonight! He's fantastic!

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  11. First of all, it isn’t crafting laziness, it is EFFICIENCY! Second of all, when you have your Slimer chain laid out on your table the coloration looks like it is going to glow in the dark, so now I want to see a glow in the dark Slimer chain!

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  12. The stay puft lettering template only prints black, any idea on size of the font?

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