Stacked Painted Pumpkins and More Halloween Decorating Ideas

Learn how to make these easy and inexpensive stacked painted pumpkins for a modern graphic Halloween display. This inexpensive craft is easy to create from dollar store pumpkins, craft paints, and other basic supplies.

Three different graphically painted pumpkins in shades of orange, black and white, stacked on top of each other.

I have a thing for pumpkin topiary. In the past, I made a Cinderella Pumpkin Topiary out of fabric, and a super large Paper Mache Pumpkin Topiary for my front porch. However, today I'm showing you how to make this easy graphic painted stacked pumpkin set for a Halloween vignette.

Three pumpkins from the dollar store. Two orange and one white with Halloween sayings in black on the fronts.

How to Make Painted Stack Pumpkins

It starts with these three craft pumpkins I found at Dollar General for $3.50 each. Ideally, they would not have any text on them but this is what I found in my area. And for $10 I thought they would be just fine for this project.

White foam craft pumpkin with the stem removed.

First, you need to remove the stems from two of the pumpkins. You can see that they are made of Styrofoam making them very lightweight.

Three craft pumpkins. Two have the stems removed and the middle one has a large wooden dowel rod in the top.

Then use a dowel rod to hold them together. You can use an Exacto knife or a sharp paring knife to cut holes in the center for the dowel rod on the bottom of the pumpkins. If you don't have a dowel rod a nice straight stick from outdoors will do the trick.

Orange craft pumpkin with cheap round stickers all over.

Next, use round stickers to make the polka dot pattern. I found these at the dollar store. However, you can use whatever size you like.

White craft pumpkin with vertical stripes of masking tape to the left and an orange pumpkin with masking tape in a plaid pattern.

Then use masking tape vertically on the white pumpkin for stripes. Then add both vertical and horizontal tape to the other orange pumpkin for a plaid look.

Three craft pumpkins with stickers, or masking tape that have been painted with black paint over top.

Once everything is taped up, cover them with black craft paint.

Once the paint is dry, carefully pull away the stickers and masking tape.

Tips for painting:

Burnish the edges of the stickers and tape before painting to make sure they stay in place.
Use a stippling action as you would for a stencil around the tape to help keep the paint from seeping through.
Use white and orange craft paint to cover the text left behind from the original print.
A black sharpie or a small brush with black paint works great for touch-ups.

Paper bats taped to the wall to look like they are flying.

How to Make Flying Bats

Another quick and fun project that goes well with the pumpkins are these flying bats.

Click on the image above to print out as many bats as you want. You can print them on card stock or ordinary copy paper. Or, you can print out one and make a template to trace onto black paper and save yourself some ink.

Little pieces of black card stock folded in an accordion style.

How to make the bats fly.

Take strips of card stock or cardboard and fold them as shown above.
Then use double stick tape on each end. Use three for each bat.
Place one in the center and one on each side.
Then, stick them to the wall to give them a 3-D effect.

Halloween display with bats on the wall, apple head witches and graphic stacked painted pumpkins on the dresser.

We now have a fun and modern looking Halloween vignette in our foyer. Three apple head witches, flying bats, and the graphic stacked painted pumpkins.

Happy Halloween!