Scary Halloween Sweets and Treats Stand

One last Halloween project for the season: how about some fun mail? My mom mentioned the other day that she never got anything but bills in the mail anymore, so I thought I'd send her a little Halloween treat. Welcome to Alpha Stamps' "Scary Halloween Sweets and Treats" stand. Please be aware of the handy candy corn stickers on the floor that indicate where to stand when ordering your favorite spooky treats; you know we're still in a pandemic.

 

Never mind that the proprietors are deceased; they're still being careful to wear masks and enforce social distancing. Aren't their little candy bags adorable? Those bags are so easy to make using the Retro Halloween Bags collage sheet. A couple of toothpicks hold up the striped awning. I used an awl to punch small holes in the stand and awning for each end of the toothpicks. Once the card is assembled, a little dab of glue will help keep the toothpicks in place.

The beauty of this little scene is that it folds flat, so I can mail it off in an envelope.

 

A lot of people plan out an entire project before starting it. I am not one of those people. Lots of what I do is trial and error and finding things that work at the last minute. For that reason, before I even started this project, I painted the entire thing black. I know I would be covering it with papers, and that the folds of the card may show.  The only thing I know I wanted to do when I started is have a striped awning, so that was done first. The candy paper was too much fun, so I decided a candy stand was the way to go. Below you can see how that paper was cut to fit the wall of the stand, plus the top of the table in front.

If ever there's a measure twice, cut once situation, this is it. I had one 6x6 piece of this paper. No room for mistakes! Here's the back of the piece, with some directions. The black plaid paper seen below is the back of the candy paper. Once I cut the paper to the correct width of the stand, I measured carefully and cut out the space for the window under the awning. Put the paper on the front. Holding things in place, carefully slice between the stand in the slits on each side of the "no glue here" part pictured below. That will be the top of the table. Cross your fingers, flip over the piece, and carefully glue only where the dotted line is. You don't want to glue your table top until the piece is fully opened. Once you've glued all that, you can carefully trim the extra paper from the top (where it says "trim here"). Once the candy paper is attached correctly, it's relatively easy to cover the front of the stand and the ground.

 

The chipboard sign adds a little fun to the scene. It's painted with acrylics and lettered with a fine line marker. I wanted to give it a hand painted look, so I didn't worry about keeping everything straight.

If you plan to shop at the Scary Halloween Sweet and Treats Stand, don't forget to stay on the candy corn stickers so you don't get sick. Isn't 2020 fun? For a list of supplies, click here.

Ghosts in the Graveyard Altered Tin

Watch out for ghosts in the graveyard! I used an Altoids-sized tin with the lid removed to make some tiny Halloween fun. An insert from Alpha Stamps' new Halloween Altoids Tin Inserts set makes a rustic fence and black cat in the foreground of the tin. I painted the insert orange, black and grey, and then added texture to the fence with colored pencils. I used a white colored pencil to outline the edges of the cat to make it pop a bit. The seated cat, front right, is acrylic.

 

 

So many ghosts! This paper, from the Halloween Market 6x6 pad, makes the perfect background. After I glued the paper to the inside of the tin, I cut a couple of the ghosts out of the remaining paper and attached them with some foam tape to add some dimension. The tombstones were painted (tutorial at the bottom of the post here; I love painting tombstones!) In checking to see how the tombstones looked behind the insert, I realized that the two shorter tombstones were getting a little lost behind the fence. I set those two stones up on some foam core (painted black) to make them tall enough to be seen.

 

Some curious ghosts were added to the border of the insert, and a small ghost was added with foam tape to the front of the tombstone you see on the right. Some lichen was pushed through the "ground" between the slats of the fence and glued behind. When I tried that smiling jack o'lantern on the top, I knew he would have to stay. This needs a little more orange at the bottom, don't you think? A couple of pumpkins there should do the trick. In this photo, the cat on the fence is not outlined yet, so he's a little hard to see.

Here's that cat with a little white pencil outline; now you see him. A black ribbon trim along the opening of the tin adds texture. Skeleton arms for that Jack; why not?

 

Happy Halloween! For a list of supplies, click here.