Halloween Makeovers

One

thing that I love to do when I am feeling the need to create, is to dig around in garage sales, thrift stores, and Saint Vincent's. To me there is nothing quite as fun as considering an object, while trying to think up an idea to transform it into something better. The creative process involved must tickle some good part of my brain, because when I figure something out, I get a rush that is hard to explain, but let's just say it is very, very good. Exciting, fun, happy, good. Being on a beautiful golf course on a sunny day and getting a hole in one in front of your best friend - that sort of good. (That last bit was to facilitate enhanced understanding for Marc, who kind of doesn't get the whole second hand, remake, re-purpose thing.)

I recently pulled out a couple of Halloween items and started thinking about how to use them this year. The witch picture I bought last year when I was shopping with Danielle. The little pumpkin picture came from TJMaxx a couple of years ago. So two little framed textile pictures, one with a flip out stand on the back, and one without.

Great start, but not enough make a decorative arrangement for my entry.

What to do.

Head to a garage sale, and the local thrift shops, of course, to look for transformable treasures to fill out a composition using my two pictures! Ahhh, creative paradise.

I figured I would need some sort of a stand for the witch picture, and some sort of an object to sit in front of the pictures, and some sort of taller object to round things out.

My first find was at a garage sale. This, kind of ugly, picture stand caught my eye because it was a good size, and it was a picture stand, but also because it had a bird at the top. I imagined what the bird could look like as a raven, and how the whole stand would look better and more spooky painted black, and I was sold for $1.00.

Then I dug around Saint Vincent's and came up with this rather unfortunately painted wooden bird. I was actually embarrassed for this bird. It was crying out for some dignity. I was thinking a black spray painted raven again. I did like the orange beak on the bird, so maybe I could use artistic license and have an orange beaked raven. (I have already taped off the beak for painting in the picture) Sold for $2.00.

My last stop was at the thrift shop. Something tall. Hmmm. I was thinking maybe I could elevate something in some sort of pedestal way. Maybe use a candlestick and attach some sort of plate or dish. I found lots of candlesticks, but was bombing out in the dish department. Nothing seemed to be working. Until I saw in the distance, sitting in all it's dusty glory, this little bit of puzzling perfection.

Puzzling because, although the dome is glass, the base and the clock are made of tacky gold plastic. I mean, who actually manufactures tacky plastic, double A battery powered domed clocks. Honestly, is there a market for this kind of thing? Anyway, I could see that I could unscrew and remove the clock and I would have a base and a glass dome. All I needed for a pedestal was a candlestick with good proportions and with a top that would fit into the underside of the clock base.

No problem, I had about 50 candlesticks to choose from.

Sold for 1.00 for the candlestick, and 5.00 for the clock...or so I thought. Turned out when I got to the check stand I was told it was half off day at the thrift store. Who knew? Got them both for 3.00. Woo Hoo.

So I took my $6.00 worth of treasures home, happy and excited to see them transformed. Here is some of the process and how they turned out:

So there you go. Made over Halloween decorations for pocket change.

By the way there were plenty of things I passed up in my search. Things like a multi armed metal candelabra that could have been my tall item. Sprayed black it would have been really spooky. I saw an ornate low metal cylinder that would have been a cool base for a medium sized pumpkin to sit on. I would have sprayed it black of course. There were many glass bottles with narrow necks that could have looked like old potion bottles with the addition of corks and computer generated labels. I came across old books that could have been altered to look like ancient spell books. An old three dimensional plastic skeleton missing some parts that could have been broken down and used as just old bones. I passed on that partly because I concentrate on "Spooky" for Halloween, and I have always avoided creepy gore, and death related stuff for the most part. There was a large hammered and embossed metal bowl with a pedestal base that could have been sprayed black and used to hold pumpkins, or what have you. Tons of picture frames that could have been sprayed black, or orange or whatever and used to frame all kinds of Halloween images. It seemed like everywhere I looked there were possibilities. It was so gosh darn fun, I could hardly believe it!

"Excuse me. Woodengirl."

"Yes, little bird."

"Well..., I..., I just wanted to say..."

"Thank you. For the dignity. It means a lot."

"You are welcome, little bird."