Wicked Witch Pumpkin Lantern Staff

Pumpkins make a great decoration for the outdoors and indoors of homes, as well as the gardens on Halloween. Why not take along your creatively carved pumpkin around with you on Halloween !! And here is how you can do that, by making a Hanging Pumpkin Lantern Staff.

If you like this instructable or my wicked pumpkin lantern idea, then please vote for it.

1. Pumpkin – a small size pumpkin

2. Paper tape – on which you can draw with a pen or pencil

3. A pair of Scissor.

4. Plastic bags or plastic roll - makes it easier to clean the work surface

5. Knife and carving tool such as scraper and a needle head tool

6. Pushpin or toothpicks or skewer (to poke holes)

7. A spoon or an ice cream scoop – to scrape out the inside of the pumpkin

8. Paper, pen, pencil

9. Kitchen towels

10. Flameless Tea lights

11. Vaseline – this is to apply for preserving the pumpkin after carving.

12. A circular object like a jar lid to draw a circle for cutting an opening- my lid is 2 inches in diameter.

13. A long fallen tree branch – if the weather is windy on your side as well then you can find a lot of fallen dried leaves and tree branches.

14. A small tree branch.

15. Dried leaves (even artificial dried leaves look good)

16. A strong brown or green craft thread

17. Orange craft tape or transparent tape

1. Pick a nice small orange pumpkin that has no bruises on the surface and has about 2 inches of stem.
2. Stick the paper tape around the pumpkin.
3. Draw the pattern you would like to carve on it with a pencil so you can erase if you want to rework the pattern easily. Once you finalize the design draw over it with a pen.
4. Turn the bottom side up and using a round cap draw a circle at the bottom of the pumpkin.

1. Using a knife at a 45 degree angle cut out the bottom of the pumpkin along the line of the circle you drew. This will form a lid and will have a place to rest when you replace it. If you cut straight down, the lid will fall in through.
2. Once you remove the bottom of the pumpkin keep it aside and scrape out the inside of the pumpkin clean. Scrape it as smooth as possible.
3. Using a kitchen towel dry the inside of the pumpkin and wipe the outside as well.
4. Now using a pointed carving tool or a push pin poke the design that you have drawn on the pumpkin. This will transfer the design from the tape to the pumpkin. (If you have the design on a paper, then stick the paper directly onto the pumpkin and poke the design.)
5. Once you have poked through the entire design remove the tape and you will see that the design is onto the pumpkin in dots.
6. Using a knife make 1/8th of an inch deep cut joining the dots and making a smooth line along the design.
7. Now using a scraping tool you can scrape the pumpkin skin within the design. This will let the light to pass through the lighter areas where it has been scraped out highlighting the design.

1. Tape the small tree branch onto the top of the bigger/long branch. Paint the paper masking tape brown or you can also use a brown craft tape if you have. Make sure the small branch coming out of the bigger tree branch is taped well to hold the weight of the pumpkin.
2. Make a small hole into the pumpkin stem. Insert the thread through the hole. Tie a knot on the stem.
3. Tie the remaining thread onto the small branch suspending the pumpkin to hang from the branch. You can wrap the thread around the small branch till where it joins the bigger branch and tape it there.
4. To add some dry decoration such as dried leaves you can pick a few leaves with long stems and tape it with small pieces of brown tape.
5. Turn on and place the tea light on the bottom pumpkin cover and put it back to the pumpkin securing it with a little transparent tape or orange tape.
6. Put on your Halloween costume and take along your carved wicked pumpkin staff for everyone to see !

Happy Halloween