Places– of Charm

Do you enjoy seasonal outdoor decorating? I’ve told you about the ghost I made prior to writing DEEDS OF DECEIT. It is currently listed as free if you’re interested in reading it– just click the link at the left.   (The ex-boyfriend of the heroine is an unemployed set designer who has reasons for scaring her as a method of control.)  Back to the task at hand, we don’t have as much autumn color in Southern California as we’d like, at least for those of us who are transplants from the Midwest and East Coast.  With Halloween on its way, I had one more spot that needed attention.  A smiling scarecrow made out of a flower pot was the perfect solution, and today I will perch him at the corner of a low brick wall containing a hedge.  My cute, country-chic scarecrow is cheery.  If you’d like to make a girl scarecrow, make the hair longer.  Add a straw hat if you like and decorate it.  Most of the crows I’ve seen in crafts stores are too big, but sunflowers are a nice touch.

Materials:

- 3 1/2” clay pot

- Acrylic paint: White, Red, Midnight Blue

- Doll head or small ceramic pumpkin

- red felt

- 4 blue pipe cleaners

- Raffia: about 100 pieces, 2” long

- Craft Glue

-Scissors

-Permanent Craft Marker

How To Make a Claypot Scarecrow

Paint your 3 1/2 inch clay pot Midnight Blue – let dry

Paint your doll head orange (or use a ceramic pumpkin as shown

Wrap strips of Raffia with blue pipecleaner. (Two pipecleaners per arm) once you are done wrapping trim the “hands” with scissors to make them even.

Cut a small tringle of red felt and glue to the inverted clay pot to create a bandanna

Glue arms to inverted pot .

Design a face on your scarecrow with a craft marker. (I had the children use simple circles for eyes, triangle nose and half circle mouth and circle cheeks.)

Waste not those trimmed pieces from the “hands” glue them on for “hair”