Creative Fall DIY Projects - Easy Autumn Decor Ideas

Autumn is the perfect time to get creative with projects, and today I'm going to be sharing several with you. From. Natural pumpkins to clay to painting, we are going to be making some beautiful and creative decorations to go all around the house. I hope you'll join me. This first project is actually very simple, but I think the result is quite lovely. We're going to be making some pumpkin candle holders out of air dry clay. So what you'll need is air dry clay. And you can choose white, terracotta, whatever other color you'd like. For this project, I went with white. You'll also need a bamboo skewer. Or something similar, a toothpick. And then I just like to cover my work surface with something to make cleanup easier, so maybe some parchment or waxed paper. And you'll also need a taper candle. Or, small votive candle of your choosing. So the first thing we're going to do is take. I used about 170 grams of clay for this candle holder, and you can choose how large you want yours to be. I recommend making it large enough that it's heavy, so it won't tip over. I also recommend using a food scale to weigh out your clay, if you're making multiple candle holders, so that they end up being pretty much the same size. And we're not going to use much water on this project because the more water you use with air dry clay, the more likely it is to crack as it dries. You're going to take your clay in your hands and work it until it is a nice smooth ball. Then, cupping it in your hands, you're going to gently press it down onto the table to create a flat bottom. I actually did this project with a class I was teaching. Of grade school children. And what I said to them was that we want to create a flat bottom for our candle holder, because rolling fire is never a good idea. I think I was the only one that laughed about that. After your ball is nice and smooth, and it has a flat bottom. We're then going to take our candle and gently press it down directly into the center of the ball. You do not want to push it all the way through. But push it down far enough that it has a good base and it stays. Then pull your candle back out gently. And all the time you're holding your clay. You want to be very gentle with it, so that you do not leave finger marks in the clay. We're then going to take the bamboo skewer, and we are going to use it to make pumpkin lines, as I call them, all the way around the pumpkin. Try to get them fairly evenly spaced. If it's not perfect, don't worry about it. Every pumpkin is different, so it can be unique. It can have character. That what that's what makes it special. Once you have all of your pumpkin lines in place. We are going to take a little extra clay and make a leaf and a little squiggly stem to come off of it. The way I like to make the leaf, and this is just the way I do it. You can do it, however you'd like. I take an oblong piece of clay and flatten it out. And then I pinch it with my fingers all around to make some points. And then I flatten out those points. And kind of shape it into whatever leaf shape I desire, and then using a toothpick, I'm going to make the little veins in the leaf. Then we're just going to take a little dab of water, just a little dab, on the back of the leaf. And adhere it to the pumpkin. You want to make sure that it's. Pretty much flat against the pumpkin, because any tip of a leaf that is sticking off of the pumpkin is going to be more prone to breaking. And then to make our little stem, we're just going to take a little dab of clay and roll it into a little worm, kind of like I did, or I'm sure you did too. Maybe with play doh or clay when you were little, you made little worms out of it. So I just make the little worm, and then I give it a little twist, so it's a curly cue. And then same thing. We're going to put a little water on it and stick it to the pumpkin. Making sure there are no fragile bits sticking off. Now comes the part where you have to be very patient. So we want this to dry slowly, so it doesn't crack. What I did was put it on a plate. Loosely covered with some plastic wrap. You could use a tea towel or whatever you want. And set it off in a corner, and it is going to take several days, if not a week, to fully dry. Another thing to be mindful about is. Clay is going to shrink as it dries. So you can either leave the candle. In the candle holder, while it's drying. Or you can occasionally go back in with your candle, and make sure the hole. Is still large enough for the candle. You may have to stick it in and kind of wiggle it around a little bit, to make sure that hole is staying large enough for your candle. I chose to leave mine unglazed, but you can buy. Paint on glazes for air dry clay. They have gloss finishes, matte finishes, so you could always paint. A finish on like that, if you wanted. I'd like to take a moment to tell you about one of my favorite vintage clothing sellers, Avery Day Vintage, and I will link her website below as well as her Instagram account so you can find it. She always has the cutest and most charming vintage dresses, skirts, sweaters, tops, and sometimes even accessories like purses. They are all authentic vintage, unless otherwise noted, and in the description, she always tells you the exact measurements of the item, the type of fabric, the era from which it comes. And she has very reasonable prices as well. I'm not affiliated with her shop at all. I just really love it, and I think you will too. I also like supporting small businesses when I can, so be sure to go check out her website, which I've linked below, and I hope you enjoy. I wanted to create a fun autumn doormat for my front porch. Our front porch really is more of like a stoop, but even little front stoops need some love and beauty, and I think they can be really nice too. So I had this coconut coir. Mat in my basement, it got a little crumpled up, but I just bent it to try to straighten it back out. And I want to turn this into a fun shape, so I decided on pumpkins. I wanted it to be like a group of pumpkins as the mat. I started out by drawing the outline of my design on the mat with a sharpie. It doesn't have to be perfect. You just have to draw roughly the outline of some pumpkins, and we'll get to the details later. Cutting through the mat was definitely the hardest part, and if you have some sort of giant shears for cutting through things like this, that would probably be best. What I found worked pretty well for me was to take a box cutter or an X-Acto knife and cut through the top layer of coconut first. And then use some heavy-duty scissors to cut through the bottom portion of the mat. Just please be very careful when doing this. Watch your fingers. Never cut towards yourself. Once you have cut out the shape of your mat. Then we're gonna go in with some acrylic paint. It's best if it can be outdoor paint. I didn't have all outdoor paint, so I used acrylic paint from the dollar store. Now this is not rated as outdoor paint, and if your mat is going to be in a high traffic area, you're probably going to be more prone to paint loss. You can spray your mat with a sealant after you're done painting. I have successfully used Flex Seal spray. It will. Slightly change the color of your mat though, and I decided not to do that this time, simply because I wanted the colors to stay bright, and our front porch doesn't actually get that much traffic. So I just went through and dabbed in the paint. A stiff brush really works well for this, and you can actually use just some of those. Preschool paint brushes from the dollar store that have very stiff bristles. I found that those worked. Really well for this. And you just want to work the paint down into the fibers of the mat. If you enjoyed this video, please be sure to subscribe for more Cottage Living, and I'll see you next time. Thanks so much for watching.