Black Spider Web Lantern

Here is a quick craft that would be cute on a windowsill, table or part of a front porch display for Halloween. (It was hard to get a good photo, black doesn't show up well.)

I started out with just an empty glass jar, like the ones spaghetti sauce comes in. I ran it through the dishwasher to make sure there was no greasy residue left on the glass.  I wanted the paint to adhere well.  Next  I drew a spider web on a piece of copy paper that I had cut down to fit the jar and taped it to the inside with the web facing out.  Using my hot glue gun I traced over the lines of the web and let it cool.  I used my hot glue gun with a fine tip. 

empty jar

Spidy on the jar

   Next I painted the entire jar, including the lid, black.  I just happened to have chalkboard paint handy, but I am sure any black acrylic paint would work.  I thought that since the chalkboard paint is a little thicker I wouldn't need more than one coat of paint.  Some areas I did end up giving a second coat of paint.  

Spooky Lantern at night

But didn't  completely cover the jar with a heavy coat of paint.  I left some areas thinner to allow the light to show through. 

 When the paint was dry I used my hot glue gun to adhere the fuzzy spider, that I bought at The Dollar Store,  to the lantern making sure not to glue the lid so I could insert a battery operated tea light inside.

Trick or Treat Banner

Here is the new Halloween banner I just completed.  I purchased a fabric panel online at Fabric.com.  It looked really cool when it arrived.  So I got busy.  First I ironed the panel, then bonded it to a plain piece black cotton fabric for the backing.  Next I cut each flag out. 

 I thought it look too plain so I took them all to the sewing machine and stitched a fancy border around each one. The two end pieces with the sculls I decided to use a stitch that reminded me of Skull and Crossbones.  On the remaining flags I stitched a feather type stitch.  Still too plain. 

 So off to my craft table and with a little Tim Holtz Distress ink I added some dirt and age with black.  Gives it a sooty look. Next I used my hot glue gun to add a few skulls, bats, and orange rhinestones.  Well, now it needed color.  Right? So off to my stash for some orange and black fibers, orange ribbon and a little orange netting trim. Finally I used my punch to make a hole in each corner and strung each flag on  brown twine. I ended up putting just a dab of hot glue in the center back of each flag on the banner to keep it from sliding along the twine. 

I love the way it turned out.  It's almost October so time to get the Halloween decorations out of the garage and figure out which one I want to use this year.

Halloween Configuration Box

Fall is in the air and my thoughts turn to Halloween Crafts.  Here a configuration box I recently completed using a single sheet of Graphic 45 Rare Oddities paper.  I added dyed cheese cloth for webs, handmade flowers and little bottles filled with different spices to resemble medicines. Coated all the shiny stuff in the background with Glossy Accents and a few orange rhinestones and a couple of peacock feathers.  Lots of little odds and ends from my stash where used throughout.  The glow that you see between the boxes was created using single strands of peacock feathers glued along the seams.

Detail view of bottles

Top View

Both Sides

Back View