Spooky Moon

Sometimes I go thrifting for the fun of it. I’ll get out $20 cash, and go from thrift store to thrift store, looking for interesting things that spark ideas.

When I saw these swirly lampshades for 50 cents each, I thought of delicate ghosts.

After much experimenting, the ghosts ended up consisting of clear labels, transparency sheets, and tulle.

I noticed an electric votive fit into the lampshade very nicely, so I took advantage of that. I cut down transparency sheets to about 5-1/2″ x 4-1/2″.

I fiddled around with some photographs, and came up with three faces.  Here’s a PDF if you would like to use them. I made this sheet, and printed it out on clear label stickers. I printed two so I would have an extra, and also so I could use the second one to guide placement.

Facial features get fussy cut. If the nose and mouth were very close together, I left them attached.

I laid the transparency down in landscape orientation, and placed the guide face in the middle, near the top. I then used it to stick down the features.

The transparency is rolled around an electric votive, and held in place with a bit of tape.

Tape goes on the top seam as well. It won’t show.

I’m using a 6″ wide roll of tulle I got from the dollar store. Cut 4 to 6 lengths of about 15″. The number of lengths depends on your taste in tulle. These ghosts have 4 and 5 lengths.

Smoosh the tulle so it gets all wrinkly. Not only will it look better, it handles better as well.

Place two lengths of tulle over the bottom of the lampshade, crossing one another.

Push the transparency with its candle down on the tulle, into the lampshade, until the candle is just under the lip.

Place a piece of tulle over the opening of the transparency roll, and push it down. Do this with the rest of your tulle lengths, crossing each piece.

Add another electric candle under the base, and you’re done.

These look best in the dark, and would be nice on a spooky black-and-white table arrangement.

Raffle status: Sorry, too delicate to ship.