Painted Foam Pumpkin Book Character Craft

• Foam Pumpkins
• Acrylic paints in assorted colors
• Foam paintbrushes
• Thin brush-style paintbrushes
• Craft foam
• Assorted construction paper
• Black permanent marker
• Double-sided tape or glue dots
• Optional –  other accessories such as wiggle eyes, craft felt, pipe cleaners, paper clips for attaching features, etc.

Foam carvable pumpkins from The Dollar Tree are a great bargain at $1 each. You could also use real pumpkins, but the foam is a nice alternative since you can use them year after year.

Instructions:

First, use a foam paintbrush to apply a coat of acrylic paint to your pumpkin. Depending on the consistency of the paint and the desired color, you may need to do several coats of paint. Make sure to let each coat fully dry.

Next, plan out how you want your features on your storybook pumpkin to look. In the examples, some pumpkin characters are just faces, like Clifford, the Lorax, Arthur, the Pigeon, and Harry Potter.

Others are entire characters’ bodies, like Captain Underpants, Pete the Cat, and Pikachu. Some features will be easier to draw on, such as eyes, noses, or mouths, while others can be made out of craft foam or construction paper. To give it faces and features, use glue dots, double-sided tape, or bent paper clips to secure them onto the book-inspired pumpkin.

Be creative – the sky is the limit!

For Captain Underpants, I mixed white paint with a touch of pink and orange to get a light peach tone. His eyes and nose are drawn on with permanent marker, and his underpants are painted on with white paint. I used permanent marker to make the stitching detail on his underpants. His mouth is drawn with permanent marker on a piece of white craft foam and affixed to the pumpkin with glue dots. For the cape, I tied together a scrap of red felt. The final finishing touch is a speech bubble with his signature phrase affixed with a bent paper clip and a piece of tape on a piece of white cardstock.

For hair and whisker features like the Wimpy Kid and Pete the Cat, simply bend and twist pipe cleaners and stick them straight into the pumpkin. Use supplies you may already have, like paper cups, to make a collar for the Pigeon or a shirt for Pete the Cat, complete with glued-on buttons.