Making Some Cute Little Wood Pumpkins

I had been wanting a craft day for a long time and I was very happy to finally get one a couple of weeks ago.  For quite some time I've had this little idea for some fall decor rattling around in my head.  I'm typically not that crafty or artistic so when what I imagined in my head turned out in real life I was so excited.  I made pumpkins!

My box of scrap pieces I keep for wood crafts

You may recall from my post last year that I love pumpkins and fall decor.  In fact I keep one on my kitchen counter all year long.  It is a clear glass cookie jar that holds various things, even cookies sometimes!  So this year I decided to try to make some pumpkin art of my own and headed out to my beautifully clean and organized garage (squeal) and picked out some pieces of scrap wood.

All of my pieces cut and ready for sanding

I used pieces of flat molding I'd picked up at the FREE WOOD bin over the past couple of years and using my compound miter saw I cut them in various lengths for square and rectangular pieces.  Once I had all my pieces I marked off and carefully cut the top two corners off of each one.

I used a scrap of quarter round trim but a piece of a tree branch would also work

Next I took a scrap piece of quarter round molding and cut a variety of pieces in varying lengths for stems.  I cut twelve of each so I could make a dozen pumpkins.

I rounded over the edges and corners with my sander

Then using my sander and a piece of 150 grit sandpaper I sanded all of these wood pieces smooth rounding over the sharp edges and giving them a more pumpkin like shape.  Once all the sanding was completed I used a damp cloth and wiped everything down to remove the dust and let it all air dry.

This is what I ended up with
I even took some and glued them together in pairs

I set up my craft table and got out all of my acrylic paints and some foam brushes as well as my glue gun.  I used orange paint with a couple drops of brown added in to make a nice deep rustic pumpkin orange color.  The back side of the molding I used has ridges on it that were perfect "pumpkin" ridges and I loved that.

The Halloween motifs are wood stickers I found at Dollar Tree

Super cute!

I had picked up some of those wooden stickers at Dollar Tree last month because I thought they were cute.  No idea at the time what I would do with them but then I figured I could use them on this project and make some of these pumpkins two sided.  I painted the stickers and hot glued them on the flat side of the pumpkin for Halloween decor and used some fall leaves I already had to decorate the ridged side for Fall and Thanksgiving.  I can just turn them around for each holiday.

I experimented with more colors of paint and did some cream and green pumpkins too, dry brushing some brown paint here and there to get the look I wanted.  I had a gob of fun creating these and I have to tell you they turned out way nicer and cuter than I ever thought they would.

Halloween

Fall/Thanksgiving

This entire project was made using items I already had on hand and the wood I used I'd picked up for free.  The acrylic paint came from Wal-Mart, the wooden stickers and fall leaves I used came from Dollar Tree.  This was a great project to do and use up what I already have.

It feels so good when you can take an idea that is bouncing around in your head and make it turn out as good or better then you imagined.  I need to incorporate more time like this into my life, definitely more crafting days need to go on the schedule.  I had so much fun making these cute wood pumpkins.