Pottery Barn Knock Off Halloween Tree {tutorial}

Whew! What a weekend. It felt like it was stuffed and filled with activity after activity..and of course some project making.  Hope your weekend was great too.  If you are visiting from eighteen25 today, WELCOME! Hope you will stay and look around for awhile.

One of my projects that started last week and poured over into the weekend was to recreate this fun little Halloween tree:

via Pottery Barn

I love Pottery Barn.  I love everything except their prices. With 3 little ones and one on the way, I am all about figuring out how to make fun things and cutting costs along the way!

Here is my version of the tree...and yes, please bask in my non-picture taking ability..and do you love my rock back yard!:)

Hope you can see just how cute it is...because now I will show you how to make it!

To make the Halloween tree you will need:

wire- lots of it. I used floral wire in ALL thicknesses..the thicker works better for the stem and for the base part of the branches. The thinner works better to wrap around the stem and branches and make it look more "tree like"

electrical tape

a carvable pumpkin-you can even pick one up at the dollar store..as long as you like the color of it, it will totally work! I got mine from Wal-mart so it is all styrofoam.

Some sort of plaster of paris..I used a filling compound from Home Depot-way cheaper..worked great!

Yellow, orange, and brown acrylic paints

Sharpie Marker

1. Gather all your supplies  2. Cut out the stem on the pumpkin. Remember you want this hole sort of small. Gather the thickest wires you have and wrap them in electrical tape..this will be the base of your tree.  Fill your pumpkin with the filling compound. 3. Place wire bundle into the compound and let set until dried and hard.  4. Next you will be taping and wiring over and over again. These pictures are to show you how I did mine. I taped, made a new bundle for branches and wired them into the base of the tree (this is important so they are strong). Keep taping up the branches and trunk of tree until you reach the top. 5. This will show you how I added to the branches to make them tree like. You can also see I wired in some skewers to make them extra strong.

6- Once you get it all taped up, it will look like this!  Make sure you have taped your ends up well..and you can even add a dab of hot glue to the last ends to make sure they stay put!  7. To paint the face I used just simple acrylic paints in a lighter yellow and a lighter orange color.

8. I also used a darker orange and brown to paint over the set up compound..don't forget this!  9. After the paint has dried, take a simple sharpie marker and outline your paint job. And just as a side note..I have also thought about spray painting the tree part with a flat black paint, so it isn't shiny..I may still do it, and will let you know how it turns out.

and VOILA..you are done..and have saved over $40 in the process!

FOR a double dose of Halloween today...You can find me here:

Making these sweet little treat buckets to hang on your tree:

Thanks for stopping by!