Today I wanted to share with you our "Family Graveyard" here at Welch House. Every year at Halloween I want to create a fun, yet realistic graveyard but I never get around to it.
Our back yard is the absolute best place to create a graveyard because its huge, filled with beautiful old trees and so overgrown that it already looks spooky. I wanted my graveyard to feel like an old abandoned country graveyard, with lots of trees and gravestones scattered about.
Every old graveyard needs a broken down creepy iron fence right? I think so! Since I'm on a budget I was super excited when I spotted these black faux iron garden fences on clearance at the Dollar Store last month. I knew they would be perfect for our graveyard yard!
The tombstones are my favorite. I had purchased a pair of 1970's dresser mirrors at a garage sale a couple of years ago, and I only paid $3 for both! I really liked them but was not finding a spot in my home for them. Then a light went off in my head and I thought of tombstones!
They were perfect! I loved how the mirrors were tall and already had a beautiful french style design of top. I have seen gorgeous tombstones on Grandin Road's website that are several hundred dollars and honestly look similar to my $3 mirrors, so I was super excited to get started!
I had my husband remove the actual mirrors and replace that area with a plywood board. Next I used gray chalk paint from Walmart mixed with a bit of sand to paint each tombstone. The sand makes the tombstone look and feel more like stone. I also added black acrylic paint here and there to add some spooky vibes and a bit of an aged look.
Using acrylic paint from Walmart, I mixed greens and a bit of brown with the sand. This mixture became my "moss". Once I had it mixed, I just patted it with my brush all over the tombstone where I wanted moss to be growing.
I had an old angel wall planter that had got broken years ago, so I decided to attach it to my gravestone and paint it to match. I added my fake moss and then once it was dry I added brown moss and a fake flicker candle to the planter.
For the angel tombstone, on a whim I wrote," Annabelle sleeps here. 1888". A month or so after I created these tombstones I learned that 85 years ago a little girl named Annabelle lived in our home! I found that a tad creepy. lol
I really had fun creating this graveyard and next year hopefully our graveyard will grow a bit! I'm going to be looking for more old mirrors, preferably plastic ones to create more graves! Maybe you will create some of your own as well!
Thank you for visiting!
-Larissa
Larissa,
ReplyDeleteWhat a creative way to decorate for Halloween! Your repurposed mirrors as tombstones are wonderful.
Judith
I don't decorate for Halloween, but this is just really cute and cool! Wow you are an artist! It couldn't be any better!
ReplyDeleteHauntingly beautiful!!! Love the tombstones!! Want to make me some?! :-) I looked at the ones that Grandin Road had to offer.... and loved yours way more! You did a beautiful job on them!
ReplyDeleteAnd finding out that an Annabelle lived in your house... chills!
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