Halloween Lenticular Portraits

The Halloween Decoration Extravaganza is ongoing at my apartment!!!  Today I am going to share three lovely lenticular portraits that I bought from the Dollar Tree.  If you aren't familiar already lenticular pictures change depending on what angle you are looking at them from.  I've loved these for years and there are some great ones online - old timey photos that transform into creepy creatures of the night right before your eyes.  Most of them range anywhere from $30 to $50 are way more than I want to spend for decor that is only up for a couple of months at most.  But within the last few years I have seen some cheaper lenticular pictures at Walmart and some dollar stores.  I have two smaller 5x7 black and white ones in my Halloween collection.

 

Needless to say I was super excited when I found these three pictures at the Dollar Tree.  They are quite large - at about 12x16 each.  The ornate frames are part of the picture itself - the entire thing is flat, there is no real frame.  I forgot to take a picture before I cut and framed my portraits so I included this picture from the Dollar Tree's website.  

These are actually really pretty and colorful and nicer than even some of the ones I have seen online so I was really surprised!  I also find it interesting that I hung mine in the exact order as the online picture even before I had seen it!

 I wanted to try and show a before (normal) and after (ghoulish) shot for each of them, but it was hard with a camera so these aren't the greatest pictures.  This is picture #1.

 

Picture #2.

 Picture #3.

As you can see I cut the portraits themselves out.  I wanted a real frame and I wanted something that looked a bit old fashioned, but I didn't want to spend very much since they were just for decoration.  I looked through the frames at the Dollar Tree hoping to find something silver, but all I could find were black 8x10 frames.  When I had almost given up I came across a box of frames that were this bronzish (sp?) sort of rust color and I thought they would work perfect for an antique looking frame.  I used the example picture inside the frame as a template to cut down the portraits and then I added a piece of cardstock cut to look like matboard just to add another touch of realism.  The cuts aren't perfect, but I don't really care - I still love the way they look - even with the awful 70's carpet lining the walls in my downstairs hallway!

 

And here is picture #1 from a different angle.  You can see my staircase in the reflection as well.

 And picture #2 again.  This one is probably my favorite :)

 

#3.  I didn't quite get the right angle on this one, she looks a bit more creepy if you stand just a bit farther to the side, but at least you get the general idea.

The above photo is looking from the landing down at my three portraits.  I'm trying to hang some spider web as you can see :)

 

Total cost for this project was $6, $3 for the lenticular portraits and $3 for the frames.  I already had the cardstock at home that I used for the matboard, but if you don't have any you could always use a regular sheet of printer paper.

I can't wait for Halloween!

DIY Decoupage Halloween Napkins as Bottle Labels

 My favorite time of year is almost upon us so I decided today that I should start decorating for Halloween.  I had David drag my Tupperware full of decorations upstairs and I also took a trip to Michael's and the Dollar Tree for decor.  I visited Hobby Lobby as well, but they are already so full of Christmas stuff that I completely got distracted and bought two lovely winter candles, but that's beside the point.  

The Styrofoam skull came from Michael's.  The painted ones like this were $7.99 with 40% off while the plain white ones were $7.99 with 20% off???  I want to use it for a craft project that I saw on Michael's ideas page, but that will be a later post.

Anyway for today's project I decided to put some of my amber vials from the pharmacy to good use.  These are two of the larger bottles and they have huge labels on them that have to be removed first.  At some point when I remember I'll do a post showing how I remove sticky labels as I have so many bottle crafts I am doing this almost daily sometimes.  I thought the amber vials would give a nice color and would also make a nice vintage looking bottle, which is what I wanted for my Halloween decor.

If you don't have amber glass then you could use an empty clear glass bottle from your fridge or even a nice wine bottle would work, which is what I want to try next!

  

You will also need Mod Podge and a paint brush.  If you don't have Mod Podge there are plenty of pins on Pinterest about making your own using equal parts white school glue and water.  Some say to use less water than glue as school glue seems to be pretty watered down as is.  The Dollar Tree has white glue two bottles for $1 in the stationary aisle.

 These adorable napkins came from the Dollar Tree as well.  There are maybe 10 napkins to a pack.  I liked these because they were double sided so I could get 2 different labels out of each napkin.  You'll need to unfold your napkin so that you can see all 4 squares.  These are sort of like 2-ply toilet paper so you'll need to peel the 2 sheets apart as you only need the printed sheet for this project.

These napkins are the larger size so they took up the entire front and sides of my amber vials (this is one reason why I think I'll try this project with wine bottles next!).  I cut away the black border and left the inner brown and green borders for each label. 

Next I took my paint brush and applied Mod Podge to all 3 sides and also let it run over a bit at the top and bottom of the bottle.  I then centered my napkin and folded the excess around the bottle.  I smoothed out any big bubbles, but smaller wrinkles actually add to the effect of an old looking label.  I let it dry for a minute or two and then used my paint brush to add another thin layer of Mod Podge on top of the napkin.  I tore a couple of tiny holes in the napkins when I was doing this, but once again it just added to the effect.  The second coat also helps to ensure that the edges of the label adhere to the bottle.

Afterwards I sat the bottles aside and let them dry completely.  Any excess Mod Podge is easily wiped off with a damp rag.

 

Here is bottle #1 Graveyard Dust - see, doesn't that make a perfect Halloween label?!  And I just love the tombstone as well :)

  

And bottle #2 - Witches' Brew/Screech's Wing Potion.  I especially like that the bottom of this napkin said "DO NOT SHAKE BOTTLE"!!!

This picture is a little off because of the flash (the first picture in this post is as well) - the colors are not this bright, but at least you can see the detail of the wrinkles from the napkins here.  I hope everyone enjoyed this project and if anyone tries it out or finds some really awesome Halloween napkins at another store please share!