Love, empathy, tolerance--also puppies, flowers, and laundry

Monday, October 07, 2013

Spooky Silhouettes

There's a time to go over to the dark side. My kids are grown and my little neighbors are quite a bit taller than I am, so it's safe to spookify my Halloween decorating a bit.

There will still be benign scarecrows and lurking bats. You might find spiders crawling over orange pumpkins. But this year I'm having fun cutting out these seriously spooky silhouettes for my windows.
 
I copied the templates (Dave Lowe's blog always has inspiring Halloween designs), laid them over some black construction paper and cut away while I was watching Netflix.  I ended up with a blizzard of coal-colored scraps to pick off the carpet, but it was worth it to gain some spooky decor.  I had them laminated for durability.  Yes, it seems silly since construction paper is notorious for fading, but I spent plenty of time cutting them out and I figure that they'll still be provide a nice dark silhouette at night even if they do turn greyish or purply over time.  It's just plain easy to tape them to the window now and you can only see the laminating film if you're really looking hard. 

I have some zombies and other creatures from the netherworld that I'm currently cutting out.

I want to enlarge these to life-size to display in our front windows for All Hallows Eve.  Enlarging them is easy but I haven't figured out how to stabilize them (black butcher paper) since they'll be too big to laminate.  Maybe a clear Contact paper sandwich?  There has to be an answer.  I wonder if I could enlarge them just enough to fit on black poster board?  Hmmm.

Stay tuned.

Bring joy,

5 comments:

  1. Seriously wicked! What about thin black foam core? You can get it in large sheets. The other thing would be wonder-under on muslin as long as the muslin is thin and you have a lamp behind it.

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    1. I've thought about getting a large clear shower curtain liner and somehow gluing them on since I want to see out the window. But I decided to cut a trial piece out of posterboard from the Dollar Tree and I'm pretty happy with it. It's not as sturdy as foam core but it's a whole lot easier to cut out!

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    2. I was reading Dave Lowe's site and it was suggested to paint the silhouettes onto fabric or plastic, which I also thought was a good idea. That way it would be easier to store.

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  2. I used the laminating sheets and pieced them all around the bigger piece and used an iron to laminate. You can even laminate one layer over another if you have to. I thought it worked great.

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