Manning Makes Stuff - Halloween decorations, paper mache masks, costumes, party ideas, and more

Spiked ceiling for my ancient Egypt Halloween party

I made this spiked ceiling for the entranceway into my ancient Egypt Halloween party. We have a small private hallway that you have to go through before entering our actual apartment, and we wanted to turn this space into the entrance to the tomb, like with hidden traps to foil would-be thieves or explorers. I didn’t take a ton of work-in-progress pictures of this project because there’s not a whole lot to show; this was a pretty easy one!

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Giant paper maché bat — part 3

See part one and part two of my giant paper maché project. When we left off we were here:

Now then, it’s time to paint!

I started my paint job on the bat by bringing him outside and protecting my work area with a cheap shower liner from the dollar store.

First, I simply applied a coat of black spray paint all over the whole bat.

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Making a giant paper maché bat decoration — part 2

See part one of this paper maché bat project here. Now, where were we? When we left off, I’d just added the wing membranes, and the head was nearly finished but not yet attached to the body.

I cut the teeth out of an aluminum cookie sheet, and I put a layer of paper maché on them; this was very difficult and annoying because the shape was so small and intricate. For the eyes, I decided to stick with the buttons I’d been messing around with earlier, and cover them with paper maché so I can more easily paint them.

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Six-foot Paper maché giant bat — part 1

For our Voodoo Bayou Halloween party, my fiancée told me she wanted a giant bat decoration. Okay!

I started with a rough pencil sketch of a bat to figure out the proportions, and then I transferred that to two sheets of foam board. I started with just the wing bones and body; no head. I cut out those pieces with an X-acto knife.

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Giant spider Halloween party decoration

This is by far the biggest paper maché project I’ve ever undertaken! I was working on decorations for my nightmare-themed Halloween party in 2013 when the idea hit me: could I make a spider decoration so big that the legs span all the way out to the walls, so the whole party takes place inside the spider’s grasp?
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