Wastin’ Time: An easy but spook-tacular project for your Halloween season
The ghost in a glass sits on a desk amusing passersby. (Photo by Jess Mancini)
Inside the glass is the green scouring pad that looks like grass. A stand poked through the pad holds the ghost and gives the appearance it is floating. (Photo by Jess Mancini)
“Boo” is just written on heavy paper and stuck on the ghost’s head, or thereabouts. (Photo by Jess Mancini)
The cloth is soaked in a mixture of glue and water and formed around a ball. (Photo by Jess Mancini)
A Sharpie or black marker is used for the eyes. Perhaps those doll eyes from a hobby store would have been better. (Photo by Jess Mancini)
The ghost in a glass sits on a desk amusing passersby. (Photo by Jess Mancini)
Inside the glass is the green scouring pad that looks like grass. A stand poked through the pad holds the ghost and gives the appearance it is floating. (Photo by Jess Mancini)
“Boo” is just written on heavy paper and stuck on the ghost’s head, or thereabouts. (Photo by Jess Mancini)
The cloth is soaked in a mixture of glue and water and formed around a ball. (Photo by Jess Mancini)
A Sharpie or black marker is used for the eyes. Perhaps those doll eyes from a hobby store would have been better. (Photo by Jess Mancini)
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I was at an arts and crafts show many years ago speaking to someone who liked my work. I explained I made everything from scratch. She was impressed, or feigned it.
The crowd was small at the time, so the other sellers around me could overhear the conversation when I made the mistake of saying "Jess Mancini doesn't hot glue a silk flower to a stick and calls it a craft." Well, a couple of people next to me, while not engaged in gluing silk flowers to sticks, their work was similar in process. I got several stern stares and the cold shoulder for the rest of the day.
Oh well. That wasn't the first time my words got me into trouble.
That said, today I bring you a spectre in a glass, a display for a desk or shelf for Halloween. This is easy and your kids can help, too.
The first thing was to find a glass about 3 to 4 inches wide. I avoid Mason jars because they are embossed and can affect the image through the glass. A brandy glass worked.
I then had to make a ghost. I patterned this off a simple costume a kid wears trick or treating. I got a piece of white cloth, cotton by the way, and soaked it in a mixture of water and Elmer's glue, about a ratio of 1:1, but it could be a little heavier on the glue side. I soaked the cloth and formed it into the shape of a ghost, the inside of the head made from a ping pong ball. After I formed the ghost, making sure the bottom hem was nearly round, I set it aside to dry and harden. You could let it sit overnight, but I used a heat gun. It got so hot, I singed parts of the cloth.
I cut a figure from heavy paper like what you see in comics to denote someone is talking and wrote "Boo!" on it. I stuck a hole in the ghost with a sharp knife and stuck it into the ghost.
I was going to use the fine shavings produced from turning wood for grass. A skilled turner can produce ribbons of wood as the chisel slices through the turning piece. I must have thrown away a couple bags of the ribbons, so another method was needed. I thought about this for several days and it came to me while I was washing a dish. The green scouring pad looked like grass, so that's what I used. I think fake grass commonly used to make a model railroad diorama would also work and perhaps look more realistic. It wouldn't have been cheaper, though.
When the ghost was dry, I painted two black eyes on the head. The scouring pad was trimmed round to fit the bottom of the glass. Using a length of stiff wire, the bottom was bent to make a stand and then was sharpened into a point and stuck through the scouring pad and into the ping pong ball. The bottom of the stand is hot glued to the pad. The scouring pad is then hot glued to the bottom of the glass. I adjusted the length of the wire to make it appear the ghost was floating over the grass. Hot glue appears to be the adhesive of choice here.
The ghost in a glass goes on my desk closer to Halloween for everyone to see.
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Unless you think this column wasn't enough of a waste of time, send ideas for "Wastin' Time with Jess Mancini" to Jess Mancini at jmancini@newsandsentinel.com.