artful thursdays #25....halloween witch tutorial

we met for our art group last week and i taught everyone how to make these halloween witches. their bodies are made with wool or cotton wrapped pipe cleaners. i thought you might like to make one of your own, so today's artful thursday project will walk you through the steps to make a wool wrapped doll for you to decorate for any holiday.

the basic supplies you will need to make the doll are wool roving, cotton pipe cleaners, and a paper face. for decorating you might gather bits from your little art shop: crepe paper, vintage book paper, tinsel, stamens, lace, stars, felt, anything sparkly, and some tiny trinkets.


step 1. fold two 6 inch cotton pipe cleaners in half and shape into a body by twisting the two pipe cleaners as shown. my pipe cleaners are the ones really used to clean pipes made by dill's.

step 2. start wrapping your wool roving on the figure in this order: arms, legs, then the body. start at the end of the hand or foot and wind your way into the body with thin wisps of wool pulled off your roving. never cut the wool fibers as they won't wrap back and catch on themselves as well. you can get some great wool roving at ornamentea.

step 3. wrap wool roving around the head to finish the figure and tuck the ends around the neck. use a bit of spray sealer to hold the wool in place if you need to or i like just a bit of tacky glue smeared on my fingers to tuck in any stray bits.


step 4. start designing the clothing. i made a little crepe paper skirt and glued it in place.

step 5. glue on little sleeves. i used some vintage loopy trim tucked over each arm.

step 6. glue on a bodice. i used a piece of halloween garland from last year. the tiny stamens are just glued in place with a black bit of seam binding tied around the middle for a sash. the sparkly tinsel is glued on top.


step 7. make a little witch hat. cut out a cone shape and glue the ends together. i decorated this one with a bit of ribbon trim and a glittered star. the black paper is vintage photo album paper. add a circle base to the hat if you like. glue on your paper face for your doll and then the hat. any old photo copied onto paper will do well. my face is about 3/4 inch tall.

here are the spooky girls made by some of the gals in my art group. i usually don't bother to take photos as the building we meet in has horrible overhead lights and a bad background. this time i just went for it. it was totally fun using just the stuff on the table to set up the photo. thank you my art friends for such a lovely evening!
this one is by Diana and photographed on her gorgeous carpet handbag.


with roller skates and a lovely porcelain head, this little witch is by cheryl.


this sparkly baby with all the ruffles is by candice


lori made this darling doll using a vintage jello mold!


amandas happy girl holds the cutest mask...


heidi was making a doll for each of her kids in their favorite costume. luke skywalker was going to be next, awesome right.


this cutie by lorraine looks like she just won the trick or treat pageant


amazing how each one is so different even though we started out with the same kit. this little pumpkin fairy i made for my pretty little felts book. her pumpkin is a wool bead with a bit of embroidery. hope you enjoy this project. spooky wishes, julie