I have a reputation to uphold. I mean, there's Frank.
And Matilda.
And Tony.
So OF COURSE I had to make a new thing this year. Time was short, though, because I decided to tear down a bunch of walls, paint some things, and generally the house has been under construction for two months. Thus, I decided it was time for an arch over the door.
A skull arch.
This was -so- easy to make. End to end it took maybe 4 hours total. I have come to the conclusion that there is nothing that PVC, spray foam, burlap, and spray paint can't do.
ANYWAY, basic instructions, ahoy!
You need 3/4" PVC cut to fit the space and elbows to make the turns, a crapton of skulls (most of them are $5 skulls from Target, although there is a good number of $2 ones from Five Below as well as some odds and ends I already had), spray foam, black burlap, and black spray paint. Oh, and a few strings of Halloween-colored lights, of course.
Start with this - cut the burlap into 4-6" wide strips. I used 20 strips per side.
Stab holes in the burlap every 6-10" apart. That's so you can wind the PVC back and forth through the burlap and create some volume/filler.There's no need to be careful while doing it, other than to make sure you keep all of your fingers.
Then it's time to prep some skulls.
Drill two holes.
Zip tie.
That's it.
Across the top I did one skull and then one piece of fabric. On the sides it was one skull and then two pieces of fabric. There are some extra arm and leg bones zip tied in between the side skulls just for funsies.
Here's how you do the burlap winding thing.
Once that was done, I wound some Halloween-colored lights around the whole thing.
From there, it's all about the spray foam. You set the whole contraption on top of some trash bags so you don't get a mess on your floor (the trash bags will peel off once the foam is dry). There's no art to the whole spray thing. You just shove the straw in the gaps between the skulls and fabric, spray a bit, and move on. It took two cans per side to fill things in and make them a bit sturdier. Once the foam is completely dry, flat black spray paint finishes things off quite nicely.
I mean, LOOK. Ignore the kids (for the moment) and LOOK!
It's lovely. And! And! I already have a plan for what I'm going to add next year.