How to decorate gourds for a Thanksgiving centerpiece

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Creative Commons | Alby Hedrick | https://www.flickr.com/photos/southernpixel/265912201/

The perfect festive Thanksgiving art project is making a Thanksgiving centerpiece gourd. In case you didn’t know, a gourd is the hollowed out and dried skin of fruit. This gourd can be used to make a beautiful and fun centerpiece for your Thanksgiving feast. There are many options of what you can make. You can make a turkey, a Thanksgiving scene or even pilgrims. Today I’m going to describe how you can create a Thanksgiving pilgrim gourd.

Here’s what you need:

– Paint brush

– Krylon paint colors

– Brown yarn

– Scissors

– Small paper cup

– Butcher paper

– Craft glue

Here’s what you do:

  1. Use a gourd that you’ve prepared that has two round parts to it, so that one end could be the body and one end could be the head.
  2. Lay out a sheet of butcher paper on your work space for easy clean up and practice painting.
  3. Use you Krylon paint colors to paint the top or smaller round part of your gourd a neutral skin color. Paint the bottom half gray or a shade of brown.  Use the same color you used on the face to paint hands near the center of the body section.
  4. Paint on the details with black and white to make the eyes, nose, mouth, buttons, coat and collar.
  5. Cut up little pieces brown yarn and then use craft glue to place the pieces of yarn on top on the gourds head turning him into a pilgrim!
  6. Then make then hat by painting a small paper cup black with your black Krylon paint color. Then on your butcher paper trace very closely the wider end of the cup. Then make a larger circle around that circle, about 2-3 inches apart. This will depend on how big you want to make the hat.
  7. Cut out the larger circle and then the hole in the middle. Think of a donut here. Then paint the paper black and set it and the cup aside to dry.
  8. Once dry, slip the donut paper you made over the black bottom of the black cup. You’ve made a hat. Now you can glue the hat to the top of your gourd.
  9. You can make a whole scene with pilgrim gourds if you’re feeling extra ambitious or just one for your table centerpiece. Happy Thanksgiving!

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