We had another Halloween party at the Casa this year, and somehow a
flash of inspiration hit me when I was thinking about decorations:
polystyrene foam balls painted like jack-o-lanterns, on christmas
lights.
I picked
up a bag of foam balls from the local craft store, and carved them out
using the cutting wheel and the sanding wheel on a Dremel.
Carve it so there’s about 1-2cm of foam shell left. You want to be
careful during this stage so as to keep a firm grip on the ball whilst
carving it, otherwise you’re likely to have the ball flick around on
the dremel, with disastrous consequences.
The face can then be cut out using the cutting wheel. Pictured here,
my favourite face. You have limited amount of creative control when
using a straight edge, so most of my experiments with faces ended up
looking unspooky or just bizarre. A hotknife can give you better
facial features but you’ve got to watch out for toxic fumes from the
foam :)
Do two coats of water-based paint, to make the colour nice and
bright. Don’t use enamel paint or you’re likely to dissolve your
precious jacks.
Drill some holes in the top for the lights to poke through, then paint
on some leaves. You can get a snug fit for the lights, but I usually
didn’t bother, so the bulb would be close to the centre of the ball
for better illumination from within.
Poke the lights in, and fix them with a dab of hot glue.
Test them! You might find some of the lights aren’t working, swap the
jacks around on the vine until you get them all glowing.
The finished product! I hung them with gaffer tape from the roof of
the patio, and then draped them around the plants on the side.
There are more photos in the polyfoam jacks
set on
flickr.
Thanks to
unknownblogger,
who has managed to make them look
superb
with the green downlight.