Day 14 ~ Write 31 Days ~ Skeleton Fairy

Skeleton Faerie?

Yes, to sit in your wreath, flower arrangement, at the table setting, or hanging around, these are fun and fast.

I create fairies all the time, usually bright and pretty, flowing gowns and sparkly wings, but for Halloween, they seem a bit too cute, in the cutesy sort of way. I want something that is more Halloweenesque to use in arrangements.

So, here's the deal, there aren't really faeries... but if there were, would hey die? I mean, can you kill a fairy?  So my  hypothesis is that you would have faeries that just live on forever, their wings would be tattered, they'd waste away to nothing, and they'd be pretty scary.

Here's my version!


I like making these little skeletons, they are so very cute, you can use whatever you have on hand, I am using burlap today, but you could use organza the same or a very light batiste, maybe tea dye it to age the cloth.
You need a bit of wire, though you could use fabric stiffener, and have a nice result. I am using a very easy to bend 22 gauge wire, it is a nice mauve color, not brown and not pink, so it is going to kind of blend in with the burlap.

I've added some paint and glitter, but you don't have to use these, I just can't do any project without a bit of glitter!

I use a bit of dried gypsophelia, you can use any small dried flower you have. This could also be a silk flower, cut up into small snips. If you could find a tiny flower that is silk, it would work.

I am using a bit of hot glue, you could use PVA (white school glue) but I like hot glue for this... if you have a closed doorway that gets sunshine, think about using the PVA. Hot glue melts in doorways... ).

Other than these items, the skeleton in the size that is similar to these, I found these skeletons at the dollar shop, they were on a jute string to hang. I simply took them off the string, painted the eyes, nose and gave the teeth a bit of shading, and it was ready to decorate.

The wings are first. Hold the wire up to

the skeleton, make sure there is enough to start with to cover the center of the back. then start rough forming the wings. I fold over the wire and copy the shape. Unfold and you have two wings similar in size and shape. Leave the same amount on the end as you did at the beginning.

Florist tape, or use some flexible type tape (I'm using artist's tape, because I had it, but electrical tape would work as well, if you don't have any tape... you could wrap string around and hotglue it!

Cover the wings with burlap.

This is totally simple. Hot glue a bit of the wire wing, lay the burlap over it, leaving an overhang of fabric on all sides, cut roughly leaving a half inch around. Cover second wing.

Pull out some of the threads from around the wing. Tattered is what you are going for.

Cut a slit in the wing itself, snip some of the lengthwise threads, pull them loose, just leave them hanging.

*If you want to use fabric stiffener instead of wire, do this part first, shape wings, snip threads, pull threads the when it is tattered, use fabric stiffener to shape the wings. Let dry.






At this point you can add a bit of paint with a dry brush, to shade the wings, but there isn't a set rule, if you don't want to, don't!

I like a bit of glitter, so a bit of brown glitter was used on the sides of the wings, and I put a bit of gypsophelia glued to the top of the wing.
Simply use the hot glue to fasten the wings to the back of the skeleton. If I were using this on the door or somewhere it would get hot, I'd use a bit of wire and wire it to the skeleton.
Glue a bit of burlap over the wing joint to hide it.

The head garland for the skeleton is just the heads of the gypsophelia hot glued down and then dotted with paint. I chose purple.