halloween decor

a stuffed witch, a cardboard black cat (thanks, walgreens), and an ill-carved jack-o-lantern (i.e. that one time i tried to carve a 'z' for zorro and ended up with a large circle on a molding pumpkin) are some of the items that  have adorned my front door in october years past. 

but this year? i'm stepping up my game and adding a new twist on my traditional halloween decor. no pumpkin guts to clean up, no knives involved...  just gold, striped and beautiful pumpkins to bring some halloween/fall spirit to our tiny apt.

 materials: pumpkins (wiped down), chalk paint, brush, gold spray paint, painters tape (i got two different sizes to mix up the chevron)

pumpkins primed and ready to go

 to start, i painted one of the smaller pumpkins entirely in chalk paint so it would have time to dry while i got the large pumpkin ready

 i taped off the largest pumpkin with the larger painters tape, angling each piece to create a chevron stripe all around the pumpkin. make sure to seal each piece on so no spray paint will seep in later.

 wrap each stem in tape to keep clean when spraying.

 for the large chevron pumpkin, I placed it on a large piece of cardboard (technically it was a dirty pizza box, don't judge) and sprayed the entire surface

 while the gold spray paint dried, i moved on to the smaller grey pumpkin. while my original intention was to  tape off chevron and spray with the gold as well, i realized the tape was taking off the chalk paint.  i decided to work with it, and love the outcome! i taped it off in a chevron pattern as i did with the large pumpkin, but with the thinner painters tape, and peeled it off to take off the chalk paint in the chevron pattern. it created an awesome, clean stripe with an antique feel.

peeling the painters tape from now dry spray-painted pumpkin

 the final result!

for the smaller gold pumpkin i wanted to create the allusion of a gold top that dripped and faded toward the base of the pumpkin.  i sprayed the top area heavily to let it drip down and lightly spray from farther away the mid-section of the pumpkin to create a fading effect.

the final product!

i couldn't be happier with the outcome. fun to make, easy to clean up and adds some fall spirit to our place!

xo,