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MIM: Cheesecloth Ghost

ghosts

pamsmakeit

This is it guys, the last Halloween Make it Monday this year. I’m sad! I didn’t make anything too scary. I’ll have to step up my game next year.

ghosts

For this item you need a short list of things:

Cheesecloth
Cornstarch (or liquid starch)
Water
some kind of apparatus to dry it on
Heat proof bowl
Microwave
roughly 24 hours or so

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First step is to add the water and cornstarch together. As I as making small one (in case it didn’t work) I halved the mix given in the link above. I built my apparatus to make sure I cut my cheesecloth to the right size before I actually cut it and then microwaved the mix.It’s recommended to do it in 30 second intervals. I did this, but mine was ready after 1 minute 45. Possibly after 1 minute 30, but I didn’t want it under done or overdone so I did it in the middle just to be safe.

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Next you let it cool a little and put it over the cheesecloth, or the cheesecloth in it or whatever. I popped the cheesecloth in and mushed it about a bit but it just balled up so – assuming the point was to get the mix into the weave – I pulled out the cloth and smoothed the mix all over by placing it on one hand and smoothing the mix on it with the other. This is messy and slightly gross, please roll up any sleeves before doing this. You were warned.

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Next it’s time to try and get the thing to drape the same way you had it during the test…Good luck with that…

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Next you wait and possibly sleep, visit a book fair or two…paint your nails, whatever. Mine took roughly 24 hours to dry. I even put it somewhere warm but ended up taking out the bottle and apple from inside to get the inner part to dry out properly.
Now, this is a Halloween ghost, so I decided it needed a scary face. I free drew one with pencil then I went over it in pen. Which dried copper, so I dug out some fabric paint and painted over the pen, making sure I filled the holes in the weave.

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Jiji doesn’t seem too sure about his new friend, looks like he’s laughing evilly – he must have been up to something…

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CONCLUSION:

This actually worked far better than I thought it did. Because the starch mix was so thick I didn’t think it would work, but I was happily surprised! I did have some trouble with my cheesecloth, because it wasn’t very wide I had to sort of fold longer bits over so you couldn’t see it was short, with varying degrees of success. But that’s on the back. I love this ghost but originally I wanted to do a bunch of tiny ones, I just couldn’t figure out what to use as a prop. Now I’ll really have to find a way to get it to work! I also want to paint him with Glow in the dark paint and leave him places that will make people jump when they turn off the light. Mwahahaha!

pamspaein

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