3-Day Dollar Store Pumpkin Make-Over

Day 1:  Shabby Chic Pumpkin



     Like just about everyone else in America, this Fall Girl is on a budget.  But with a little creativity, even the most fiscally conservative among us can still have great Fall decorations.  For the next three days I'll show you how to play Fairy Godmother and transform a frumpy Dollar Store pumpkin, into a cute and thrifty pumpkin decoration that even Cinderella would be proud of.  It's as easy as bibbity, bobbity, boo!

 

     Behold!  The humble Dollar Store pumpkin.  Notice it's creepy, pitted foam texture and mysterious square shaped stem.  I wouldn't want one of these lurking around my Fall décor.  For Day 1 of my three-day journey, I decided to give this hot mess pumpkin the Shabby Chic treatment.

 



 

 

     I started with a can of white spray paint.  I like Krylon because it usually goes on smoothly and hardly ever gets clogged.  I had to use 5 coats of spray paint to cover up that stubborn orange color and still had to use acrylic white paint to mask the orange bleeding through.  That much spray paint turned the "stem" of the pumpkin into a withered nub so I just ripped it off.  It was disgusting, I should've taken a picture for you.

 

 

 

     After I finally killed all of the day-glow orange residue and my pumpkin was a fairly even shade of white, I cut a narrow strip of burlap (about 3 inches wide) and hot glued it around the center of the pumpkin.  To keep the burlap from gapping, I gathered and glued the top and bottom, pressing firmly to completely adhere it to the pumpkin.

 

 

     Then I cut a length of lace ribbon and hot glued it to the center of the burlap.

 

 

     For the final touches, I used hot glue to attach a piece of bark that I found in my back yard to the top of the pumpkin to make a realistic stem.  Then I draped a chalkboard tag around the stem and used more hot glue to hold it in place.  Near the stem I nestled in a little clump of faux orange and yellow berries, that I also found at the Dollar Store, for a little pop of color.

 



 

   Here's the final product.  Wasn't that easy?  Stay tuned tomorrow for my attempt at turning my Dollar Tree pumpkin into a hammered metal, Pottery Barn knock-off, pumpkin.  You won't believe how easy it is!