A Halloween Craft (Candle Jars) and a Book

Halloween is not even close to my favorite holiday, but since having kids, I enjoy it much more than I used to. Ever since Aaron was born, we've planned our costumes around a theme (this year we're going as pirates), and I'm hoping my kids will humor me with this tradition for at least a couple more years.

Fall break was earlier this month, and since Mike couldn't take any time off work, we didn't have any really exciting plans.  But out of all my kids, Aaron is the one who just lives for crafts, so I knew if I had just one thing for us to make, he would consider it a successful break from school.

I found these Halloween lanterns at Red Ted Art and thought it would be a fairly simple craft. Plus, my kids love decorations, and, I'll admit, I do very little decorating for Halloween, so now they'll at least have one thing they can pull out every year.

If you're looking for a way to fill the hours before trick-or-treating tonight, you might give these Halloween candle jars a try:

What you'll need:

Glass jar (we used a couple of mason jars and an old olive jar
Orange, green, or white tissue paper
Mod podge
Foam brush
Black paper

First, tear all of the tissue paper into pieces--the more irregular, the better.

(The night before I wanted to make this, I went through all the supplies (all five of them) in my head to make sure we were good to go. However, the next morning when I went to get the tissue paper, it wasn't where I thought it was supposed to be. I could find some white and green, but no orange. I had no desire to run to the store with four kids in tow (these are the times when I wish my mom lived next door) just for tissue paper. In my search through the house, I found some orange crepe paper left over from a trunk-or-treat several years ago. So we used it instead. It didn't hold up to the glue quite as well as the tissue paper, but hey, it worked and saved me a trip to the store.)

Put down a layer of mod podge on the jar. Arrange the pieces of tissue paper on top (some overlap is good).

 

Go over all the tissue paper with another layer (or two) of mod podge. Aaron could do most of this on his own (but not without a big glue mess all over the table), but the other two needed quite a bit of help.

Cut out pictures or jack-o-lantern shapes for the front. For the silhouettes, I just printed them, and then we cut them out. For the jack-o-lantern, I freehanded it out of black cardstock.

 

Put the pictures where you want them and then mod podge over the top.

Let it all dry. Put a candle (or in our case, a tealight) in the bottom and enjoy the spooky light while reading a scary (or not-so-scary) book.

Like this one:

I reserved very few Halloween books at the library this year. I don't know why. I guess I just wasn't feeling it.

However, I did check out this new book by Kazuno Kohara. We love her other Halloween-esque book, Ghosts in the House, and The Midnight Library was delightful as well.

It's about a little librarian who works in a library that is only open at night. The story focuses on one night in particular when some of the patrons forget to use their library manners. The little librarian finds creative and kind ways to help them with their problems.

The story itself is fine and cute and all that, but it's the illustrations that make this book a real treat. A limited color palette (light orange, blue, and black) with the characters being outlined instead of colored in makes these pictures fun and different to look at. I seriously would like to frame four of them and put them up as Halloween decorations.

I hope all of you have a safe Halloween filled with yummy treats, awesome costumes, and fun neighborhood activities.

 

What are your Halloween plans for the day?