spooky ghosts

Friday afternoon, the girls and I made ghosts for Halloween. You know the ones. The white gauze fabric, fabric stiffener, balloons and coffee cans. I remember doing a craft like this as a child for school and it stuck with me. I can not believe how much fun this was for all of us.

Yaya is unbelievably awesome because she purchased a bag of cassava starch (in place of fabric stiffener. As a child she used to boil this to make a thin solution her family used to dip clean clothes in to make nice and stiff without ironing) which she then added to boiling water and thickened until it was a steaming hot clear gelatin like mixture. As she stirred and cooled the liquid got thicker and thicker. Bella loved stirring and then putting her hands in to feel the gooey cassava starch. It is all natural and non-toxic so we felt safe letting Bella join in the fun. You better believe, she tasted it many times.I couldn't find big pieces of white gauze so I ended up buying six little boxes of medical gauze that was about 5 inches by 6 feet. I attached balloons of different sizes to objects that would allow them to stand while we draped the gooey gauze over the balloons. Lessons learned: Do not use a half empty wine bottle for a "weighted base". I also learned that draping the balloon with lots of the dry gauze first and then running my gooey hands over the balloon and down the strips was a better method than dipping the gauze and then trying to reshape it after it was clumped with goo.I initially tried to direct Addie how to dip the gauze in the goo and then drape it on her balloon. That went smoothly for a few minutes until she just wanted to play. So that's exactly what she did. We laughed and got gooey and squealed when one of my balloons popped mid-project. I saved it quickly by transferring my gauze to Addie's balloon (she had long abandoned it and was making "goo pie" on the wax paper instead). We let them dry and stiffen up overnight and then popped the balloons in the morning. They stand nicely on their own all stiff and see through. Spooky black eyes and a mouth finished off the project! I love how they turned out. Ultimately they will be hung from the ceiling for our Halloween party. Right now the ghosts are haunting the dining room table.