Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Oh Martha....

Today I'm revisiting my love/hate relationship with Martha Stewart. Today I love her...tomorrow could be different.

I've been hashing away at the to-do list for this year's Halloween party. The plan for The Hollow Cemetery mostly consists of tombstones, skeletons and ghosts. The problem with that is that I have no ghosts. What's a ghoul to do?!

I have a collection of inspiring ghost props ideas. These made with chicken wire:

picture source: The Modern Mourner

As are these - complete with how-to:

picture source: Wacky Archives

Alas, I had no chicken wire and needed to get busy. Enter Martha to save the day!

picture source: Martha Stewart

Her ghosts require items I already had on hand; cheesecloth, styrofoam heads and glue. My youngest and I whipped out a few of these in an afternoon watching the dreadfully bad Malibu Shark Attack. (Oh Peta, how far we have fallen from Nikita.)


These are simple-simple and fairly inexpensive. I recommend buying cheesecloth from a bolt rather than small packets if you can. Styrofoam heads can be found at Hobby Lobby (be sure to use your 40% off coupon as they are over-priced otherwise.)

Here's our take on Martha's Cheesecloth Spirits:


These are currently residing in my studio closet awaiting their debut. I think these will look great with a blue light cast upon them in our cemetery setting.

Haunt on.

8 comments:

  1. I've been thinking about play-dough alot lately. Seems like the perfect sculpting material to match with paper mache (or cloth and glue mache).

    But you could easily build up a face onto one of those styrofoam wig heads, and then mache it with cheese cloth. I bet you could get a great effect out of it!

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    1. I think it would be worth a shot Mantan. I've never tried it but I say go for it.

      The main concerns would be cracking. I remember Play Doh cracking as it dried so maybe try to get it to dry slowly by keeping a damp cloth over it?

      Do let me know if you give a try, would love to hear how it works for you!

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  2. Nice job! Your right, Some blue, especially LED's will make them really pop! Make sure you post some pics of your final Halloween setup!

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    1. Will do Mark! Can't wait to see them in the yard.

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  3. Very cool!! Yeah...I feel the same way about Martha....what is a girl to do :)

    Cheers!

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    1. She has some clever ideas but damn she can annoy me :-)

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  4. I too have a love hate relationship with Ms. Stewart. Your Spirits look great, I loaded up on the wig forms this weekend. I found a woman selling yards of white tule (daughter was just married) I'm thinking of trying instead of the cheesecloth, not sure if it will work. Are you hanging yours somehow? Would love to see a picture of them under creepy light.

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  5. We took the wig head cheesecloth ghost idea and made two, added arms and worked them into a mobile so they move around. We positioned them over a cluster of gravestones and lit them up at night with a green spotlight. The effect was great!

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