Halloween Altered Bottle & Book

I have been busy getting a few projects done for Halloween and today this post is a twofer. I was working on two projects at once and the pictures mingled together. The first one is a bottle I transformed with clay and the second is an altered book.  Okay, so maybe it isn’t a real book but my husband gave me a paper maché fake book that he had by his desk.

I bought a package of plastic Halloween favors at the dollar store for the book. Using tacky glue I glued a skeleton to the front of the book and a skull to the spine.

I used a rubber band to keep the skull  in place while the glue dried.

While the glue was drying, I switched to my red wine vinegar bottle that I thought was a really awesome shape to put a ghost face on. If I buy something that has an interesting or odd shape bottle or jar, I keep it to use for Halloween.

First I needed to build up the neck of the bottle so I used tin foil around it. I rolled out my Sculpey clay  to about a quarter of an inch thick to cover the entire bottle.

To build up the eye sockets, I rolled out more clay and cut the shape of the eyes out then placed them on the bottle where I wanted them. I used a bit of burlap and pressed it into the clay for some texture. The bottle was ready for baking. I baked it for 20 minutes at 250 degrees.

While it was baking, I went back to the book and brushed on a crackle medium which took no time at all to dry. I painted over that with a buttermilk colored paint. To age it I used an antiquing wax over the whole book and then painted the inside a bright red. On the spine, I wrote “potions” with a black sharpie and went over it with red paint.

I finished up my bottle that had been cooling down, now that the book was done. Somehow my clay cracked while it was cooling. Luckily, the crack was in a spot that I was going to cover up anyway.

I painted the inside of the eyes black and used the antiquing wax on the clay. I cut a square piece of burlap to put over the cap. To finish it off, I wrapped jute cord around the cap and tied it off. Done and done!

 

Here is an old thesaurus I altered a few years ago that I turned into a spell book.

And here is my witch’s table this year. I love it so much! I have made most everything on it, the altered bottles, the nightshade canister, books, candlesticks, a small gazing ball, and the bird skull to name a few.

I will be linking up with these parties.