As we’ve discussed time and time again, I’m lazy, and while I love Halloween, I love any excuse I can make to NOT take down my decorations once they’re up. That means on November 1st giving all my pumpkins festive Santa hats. It also means I get to continue this theme by breaking out my Haunted Mansion inspired Man-Eating wreaths and adding them to my already up Halloween decor ala the Haunted Mansion.
Anyone who has ever been to Disneyland during the holiday season and taken a ride on the Haunted Mansion knows they love to transition it over to a fully immersive Nightmare Before Christmas theme. A large part of that theme is the absolutely amazing and awesome mashing up of Halloween with Christmas.
As you pass through the ride, at one point you are tipped backward down a hill. Above you, laughing at you leers a huge man-eating wreath.
For anyone wanting to bring a little of that “Making Christmas” magic home, an easy and affordable DIY version of the now-iconic Haunted Mansion Man-Eating wreath is perfect.
To make your own, you will need:
- 1 artificial wreath
- 1 red bow
- 1 sprig of artificial holly berries
- 1 large sheet of white craft foam
- 1 sheet of black craft foam
- Skull pattern printed out (see below for file)
- 1 string of large bulb Christmas lights
- Scissors
- Black permanent marker
- Glue gun and glue sticks
- 1 roll of artificial pine swag (optional)
- zip ties (optional)
- 2 rare earth magnets (optional)
Start by first attaching your bow to your wreath at the ‘bottom.’ Depending on the type of bow you selected, this may be as simple as twisting the wire that’s attached to the bow around the metal ring that makes up the center of your wreath. If your bow doesn’t have a twist wire, hot glue works well.
Using your scissors, cut your white foam sheet into jagged and sharp ‘teeth.’ Measure them against the center of your wreath as you cut them out to make sure they’re long enough. It’s easy to trim off excess so don’t worry about making them too long.
Make sure when you’re cutting your teeth that you save a piece of white craft foam about 4″ square. You’ll need it to make your skull later.
Once you have your teeth, arrange them around the top and bottom of your wreath on the backside. Once you are happy with them, glue them in place with your hot glue. Don’t worry about being ‘neat’ or ‘perfect.’ Part of the charm of our man-eating wreath are the imperfections.
If your teeth are a bit long simply trim them down to fit.
Using your scissors, trim your berry sprigs, snipping off the berries.
Flip your wreath over so you have the bow side facing you.
Using your glue gun, start dotting blops of glue around your wreath wherever you want your berries to appear. Gently press your berries into the glue, clumping them together in groups of two and three.
Now let’s make the eyes for our wreath. For my version, I like to use real Christmas light bulbs. You can pick up a string of large bulbs like this from just about any drug store right now. I also know Walmart sells entire boxes of replacement bulbs in a variety of colors.
Using your scissors, clip two bulbs off of your string, trimming the wire as close to the base of the bulb as possible.
At this point I have to step in and tell you when it comes to the color you select for your wreath, it’s perfectly acceptable to use either the yellow bulbs or the orange bulbs. I have made both versions and they both look good! Just go with what makes your dark little heart happy and call it done.
Position your bulbs at the top of your wreath where your eyes are. To give your wreath a slightly menacing look, tilt the eyes so they point down towards each other slightly. Tilting them up will give your wreath a more concerned look. Once you’re happy with how they look, glue them in place.
Now let’s make the skull that sits in the center of our bow. Download and print this file here:
Print it out on a standard piece of 8 1/2″ X 11″ paper. You should end up with this:
Because wreaths come in a variety of sizes, the sheet has multiple choices for you to select from. Find the one that best fits your wreath and cut it out. This will be our template for the foam.
Trace your skull pattern out on the piece of white craft foam we saved from our teeth we cut earlier.
Carefully cut your foam skull out.
Next cut a piece of black foam to fit behind the white skull in order to black out his eyes and nose holes.
Glue the black foam to your white skull and trim off the excess.
Position your trimmed skull down on your bow and adjust it until you are happy with its placement. Glue into place with hot glue.
Almost done! Now, using your black permanent marker, draw small dots on your bulbs to represent the pupils of your man-eating wreath.
At this point you are welcome to call your wreath done and hang it up as is!
Of course, if you look at the original, he has long trailing ‘arms’ reaching out towards you. To make those, simply attach a length of artificial pine swag to both sides of your wreath and position as you want.
I mean, come on…that looks SO GOOD!
I’ll be honest, I have these all over my house. I have one on my front door, one on my back door, and one hanging over the gate that leads into my yard. I also have one on my car!
To add one to your car, all you have to do is zip tie it to the grill of your car. To make the ‘arms’ wrap around your front fender, I add rare earth magnets and tuck them under the hood, sticking them to the metal of the car body to help hold them in place.
And that’s it! Each wreath, depending on how much you spend on materials, can be made for less than $10 – and because they’re made from artificial greenery, they’ll easily last multiple seasons!
But wait, why not make some edible versions as well? That’s right, we have miniature edible man-eating wreaths as well!
Get the full recipe here.
Bone appetite!
