Halloween DIY: It's The Stay Puft Pumpkin Man!

I've seen 2 or 3 Stay Puft pumpkins floating around online, and knew THIS was my year to finally make my own. My only concern was spending a small fortune on fake pumpkins, since lets face it, those things are PRICEY.

John and I went pumpkin bargain hunting, and eventually found everything we needed at Walmart for about $30. So not super cheap, but worth it if you're a big Ghostbusters fan like me.

Here's what you'll need to collect from the Walmart pumpkin aisle:

 

 The largest pumpkin is $10, the medium is $5, and the 8 small ones are $1 each. Then there's a bag of mini pumpkins for $3. We also bought a few sheets of colored felt.

You'll also need some long wooden skewers (yes, the kind you roast marshmallows on! Appropriate, yes?), white spray paint, hot glue, a little stuffing for the hat, and some craft paint. 

I also used a little stretchy white fabric for the hat, but you can use white felt instead.

In two nights we'd turned our pumpkin pile into the world's most huggable Halloween decoration:

 

LOOK HOW CUTE. My sweet marshmallow boy!! 

Isn't he adorable? Every time I pick him up I have to hug him, haha.

Once you have all the right pumpkin sizes, putting Stay Puft together is pretty simple:

First figure out how you want to stack his arms and legs.

Then skewer the smaller pumpkins on your wooden sticks, and jam them into the body. For extra strength - and to prevent them from spinning - add a dab of hot glue between each pumpkin.

Put the "hands" & "feet" on just partway, so the skewer doesn't poke through the opposite side.

Now, I hate sewing, so I cheated with the hat. All I did was wrap a square of white fabric around a little stuffing, tie it shut with string, and trim off the excess fabric:

Boom. A hat.

Well, not quite; it still needs the brim. For that I covered a strip of cardboard with blue felt: 

... and twisted the brim into a circle, hot-gluing it shut. 

Finally I hot-glued the brim in place around my white fabric pouch.

NOW it's a hat.

I used the rest of my blue felt - and a little red - to make his little sailor collar:

 

It's easiest to put the collar UNDER the head instead of around it, so don't glue the head on until the very end, after everything is painted.

Final mock-up before painting:

I used my Cricut to make the letters on his hat, but you could paint those on with fabric paint - which would actually be sturdier, since these vinyl ones can be peeled off. If you're lazy like me and have a Cricut, though, then here's the template to cut your own:

 I also cut vinyl strips for the white outline on his collar. 

(Does my crafting laziness KNOW NO BOUNDS? No. No, it does not.)

The next night we spray-painted the whole thing flat white, making sure to keep the head separate from the body.

Once the paint was dry, I hot-glued on the collar and then the head:

Finally I painted on his face, and glued on his hat.

DONE.

Ta-daa! We've been displaying him in our kitchen window.

But wait! I decided his open arms looked empty, so I sketched a little Slimer:

Which John turned into a paper chain for our Cricut to cut:

 

It's big, so it's cut in two pieces. 

Here's the template we made, in case you'd like to make your own!

(Right-click to embiggen, then save to your desktop.)

I glued two of the hands together to form a longer chain:

I also outlined the edges with a Sharpie to give him more definition.

I attached the paper chain to Stay Puft's hands with poster tack, so I can easily remove it if I think of something more fun for him to hold. (He'd be adorable holding a party banner with someone's name, or even just "Happy Halloween!")

 And NOW he's done!

I hope he makes you smile as much as I am right now. :D

I also hope this inspires some of my fellow Ghostheads out there to make their own Puft-kins!

Stay tuned for more Ghostbusters Halloween builds this month, since we're planning to BUST OUT all our outdoor decorations this year. (Just as soon as I get over this head cold, darn it.)

*****

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