Creative Jack O' Lanterns for Halloween

It is time to start thinking about Halloween if you want to do some Halloween crafts. With the fun carvable craft pumpkins available in so many shapes and sizes, it is time to start making some creative jack o’ lanterns! There are also some fun and great priced faux pumpkin jack o’ lanterns that don’t require any carving at all!

This is the “J” in my alphabet series!

If you want to go for the custom carving of your jack o’ lanterns, I have some tips to share before you start carving them! The first thing I do to prepare the artificial pumpkins is to paint them to make them a little more realistic. I start out with Folk Art Treasure Gold Green Gold color. Each ridge in the pumpkin gets a fine line of with that paint. Next I use a combination of two shades of orange, Deco Art Canyon Orange and Spiced Pumpkin. I pull those two right over the green gold stripes while they are still wet.

This is certainly not a necessary step, but I really like how it makes my pumpkins and jack o’ lanterns look.

If you want to carve your craft pumpkin into a jack o’lantern, I recommend drawing your face onto the pumpkin before you begin carving.

You certainly can use a knife to carve, but my experience is that the easiest and most accurate way to carve your pumpkin is using a wood burning tool. DO NOT allow children to use a wood burning tool! They get very hot and quickly slice through craft pumpkins.

One of the ways I most like to customize my jack o’ lanterns is to paint them fun colors. Last year I painted lots of craft pumpkins pink, and went to work carving them. Note that after carving the pumpkins, I painted the edges where I cut them black. If you don’t want to paint them black, at least paint them another color to make your jack o’ lanterns appear more finished.

Don’t overlook some of the jack o’lanterns that come what I will call “pre-carved”. This is just one of several different pre-lit jack o’ lanterns you can find at Target! At just $15 for this 16″ tall jack o’ lantern this is a great value and will save you a lot of time.