We always have fun when we create with egg cartons. Our egg carton spiders are one of our favourite Halloween craft projects for kids to make. We have shared all kinds of silly pumpkin crafts and activities and these egg carton jack o'lanterns are so much fun to make and share with friends.
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The great thing about this craft project is that it works as a creative egg carton Halloween craft or a Thanksgiving craft. These pumpkin candy cups would make a cute addition to the family Thanksgiving dinner table or can totally be passed out to the kids' classmates for Halloween.
I always love finding ways to use items we already own to craft - upcycling is my fave! We always have empty egg cartons...do you? If you don't happen to have one, never fear, did you know you can buy paper egg cartons? Or, ask around and I bet your friends and family can save one from the recycling bin for you to use.
Egg Carton Jack o' Lantern Candy Box
paper egg carton
scissors
orange acrylic paint
purple acrylic paint
green, brown and orange pipe cleaners
black and purple permanent marker
thumb tack
The first step in making these little jack o'lanterns is to trim down the egg carton into individual cells. This is the same thing we do when making our egg carton flowers. Use your scissors to cut and divide up the egg carton into little individual cups. You can keep the scraps for other craft projects. We trimmed ours and paired them together and then trimmed them some more.
Once you have all the egg carton cells cut it is time to paint them. Start with the outside, orange paint. We painted two coats of orange acrylic paint. Set them aside to dry and then...
...it's time to paint the inside of the egg carton cups purple. You could paint the inside orange too, but we like the combination of purple and orange - very Halloweenie. Set them aside to dry.
Once the paint has dried, it's time to add the hinged lid to our jack o'lanterns. Determine which side of the pumpkin you want to use as the "face" and the hinge will go on the opposite side. Poke the thumb tack into the back of the top and the bottom of the "back" of the pumpkin.
Feed the orange pipe cleaner into these two holes...kind of like a staple. Stack the two pumpkin halves on top of each other and bend the pipe cleaner end in place inside the pumpkin. Test out opening and closing the jack o'lantern.
Next up, let's work on all the pipe cleaner details. You will want 1 length of green pipe cleaner, cut to 4.5 inches length for each pumpkin. Then, you need 1 length of brown pipe cleaner cut to 1.5 inches. And, finally, 1 length of orange pipe cleaner cut to 2.5 inches.
The green pipe cleaner will be the pumpkin vine, wind the pipe cleaner around a pencil or paintbrush to create the twisting vine. Set the pipe cleaner pieces aside.
You may need to trim the top edges of the egg carton, so the pieces come together nicely. Once the hinge is in place and you like how they close, run the purple marker along the edge of the egg carton halves to tidy up the edges.
Time to add the vine and the stem. Again, use the thumb tack to poke a hole in the top of the pumpkin. Make sure the hole is a little bigger for this one, as you will be feeding two pieces of pipe cleaner into the hole. Poke the brown piece of pipe cleaner into the hole. Fold the end that is inside the pumpkin to secure it in place. Bend it into a stem shape that you like. Finish by adding the green pipe cleaner vine to the top hole. Feed it in with the brown stem and fold the end inside to secure it. Twist and turn the vine however you like.
Okay, you could totally leave these little pumpkins as they are - faceless. Or, use a black permanent marker to draw on jack o'lantern faces. This part is totally up to you. Will you draw silly faces? Or, scary faces? I think ours are a combination of both!
Fill your little pumpkin treat cups with Halloween candies and get ready to share them with friends. If you will be transporting the little pumpkin cut you will want to wrap an additional orange pipe cleaner all the way around the pumpkin, to stop it from popping open.
I think we will be decorating our Thanksgiving table with these little cuties and adding them to our Halloween decorations too. We love how they turned out. What do you think?
More Halloween Crafts
Make a spider web filled with egg carton spiders
Learn how to decorate pumpkins with markers
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