The Mayor of Halloweentown! A Nightmare Before Christmas Halloween How To

So it's been ages since I posted - but I will write about that later (all is well, I am just suffering from lack of time due to having a living tornado in my house - aka my toddler).

Anyhoo - on to the fun stuff! Making the Mayor of Halloweentown from The Nightmare Before Christmas - using a cardboard Christmas tree, some paint and some posterboard:

In this town we call home, everyone hail to the pumpkin song!

If I were a better photographer I could show you that he looks EVEN cooler than he does in that picture! This may be one of my favorite crafts - hands down. What can you do with him? Stick a (flameless!!!) tea light in there, fill him with candy, put him on a shelf for all to see! What can't you do with him!

Ok - enough exclamation marks - this is how I did it:

1. Buy a cardboard tree from Hobby Lobby they are there now (or were last weekend). It was $5.50 on sale.

2. Draw an outline of his face, marking off the area for where the hat will be

Do it in pencil so you can erase if you mess up!

3. Take a sharp exacto knife and cut out the inside of his mouth. Please don't cut your fingers off. Please.

This is the most tedious part. But I didn't cut a finger off...so there is that.

4. Start painting - these are the colors I used:

5. Start with his skin:

There are a lot of different peach colors but Folk Art's 'Fleshtone' got the right orangeyness

6. Then paint a thin red border around his mouth:

Pro tip - water your paint down a little to make it go on smoother - I used Berry Red here

7. Add the black background.

For black I used Lamp Ebony. The shapes are pretty easy - just remember his eyes are kind of egg shaped.

 

8. Add his rosy cheeks - just two circles:

Peony pink here

9. Add the eyes - one is a small dot - the other is a swirl. I really like 'Pineapple' here because its not a flat yellow.

10. Paint the hat black:

My gameroom is a mess. I thank Baby J for this.

11. Outline the eyes and mouth - this part is tricky - you could leave it off if you wanted.  Again, water your paint down a little

12. Make the brim.  I used black posterboard and totally just guessed.  I cut the center hole big enough until I could slide it down to where the black and peach met. It naturally waves a little bit which works because so does the mayor's hat.

Center hole not quite big enough here!

Much better! No glue needed!

13. Make the teeth - white cardstock and a sharpie marker. I just cut rectangles and drew straight (ish) lines.

14. Glue in his teeth and DONEZO!

And here's the man himself!!!

Happy Halloween!!! Please take a pic if you do this and share!!! I'm going to do that sad mayor soon and will trying very hard to keep up with posting!!