Nature Halloween Craft: Twiggy Jack-o’-Lantern

Having very recently moved to a new farm we have been busy doing two things. The first, perhaps most obviously, is enjoying our new property, chickens, and time spent outside. The second, as many people do after an expensive move, we are also trying to save money. With Fall comes lots of gorgeous nature items to use in learning activities and decorating—for free!

One afternoon while we were out exploring, my 4 year old and 2 year old decided to collect some twigs. Like many little ones, when collecting they tend to go against the philosophy that, 'less is more'. And, because Mama is also the collectors' assistant, within a few minutes my hands were full of twigs of every shape and size. Since we are saving money and using what we have on the farm, I thought that these twigs could make a great Fall decoration, and they did!

We brought the twigs inside and while the boys took a break and had some hot chocolate, I made a pumpkin shape out of the sticks. I broke some twigs very tiny, and got gradually bigger, and then tiny again.

I thought the pumpkin would look lovely just like that, but my little ones decided it HAD to be painted orange (of course). So the sticks were all painted orange.

Next, I covered a piece of wood with some burlap we had left over. You could make this twiggy pumpkin on anything at all that you have around the house though.

Once the twigs were dry, we put all the sticks into a big pile, and my 4 year old and I sorted them. Since this was a different sort of sorting activity, I sat with him to offer some help. We found the two smallest twigs and put them on the outsides. Then we found the next two smallest twigs and worked our way in to the middle of the pumpkin.

The teacher in me loved all the learning that was happening, and the use-what-you-have Mama in me loved the way this decoration was shaping up.

We glued the sticks to the burlap-wrapped wood. Sam first of all glued them with white glue, but because I was not sure whether I would use this decoration inside or outside I added some hot glue.

We build letters and words out of anything as often as possible, so took this opportunity to write the word F-A-L-L out of twigs.

And in a last moment of creativity, the kids decided we should turn this pumpkin into a jack-o-lantern. I cut some eyes, a nose, and a mouth out of some electrical tape and they were popped on the pumpkin for the transformation into Jack.

This was a lovely way to end a day spent outside exploring. And we have a lovely keepsake to remember it by too!