Happy early Halloween to you all!

Today is laundry and cleaning catch-up day because I have been in the craft room and letting everything else go a bit.  I just recently watched The Gentleman Crafter’s  3 part video series titled Epic Village Shoppe.  GREAT project!

After viewing the video I decided to make a Halloween themed project that I could send to my grandson in Missouri.    I just sent the project off in the mail today and before I sealed the box I snapped a few pics to share.  Thanks Jim for your awesome project…it inspired me   🙂

This year my grandson decided that he was going to go “scary” for his costume.  He feels it is time to discard the cutsie and go bold and creepy so I created this project for him.   I made Jim’s “shoppe” into a closet with skeletons inside….hence my Skeletons in the Closet title.

I used the Me and My Big Ideas Mambi paper pad, Tim Holtz goodies and also some homemade diorama spookies inside.

For the door knobs I decided to use up some of my skeleton beads.  I threaded a couple of gold head pins through the beads and added black accent beads.  They make great handles to open the doors.

I have two straps with magnets attached at the top of the box so that the doors are secured tightly but when you life the straps and open the doors you see the inside of the closet.  I cut around one of the skeletons from the paper collection and mounted it on Stampin’ Up! dimensionals.

Inside the diorama is a spooky black chipboard tree and a skeleton hand holding poison.  I added some shrink plastic ghosts and owls along with the white mica flakes and black and silver chunky glitter.  My grandson can shake the box and get the ghosts and owls to land on the tree or hand or anywhere he chooses.  I just love how the glitter sticks to the acetate leaving a foggy effect and the remainder lands onto the bottom of the box and looks like disturbed earth.

I love the metal feet from Tim Holtz but they needed to be grunged up a bit so I painted them with an Ivory acrylic paint.  Once dry I dripped a few shades of alcohol ink over the paint.  Love the effect!  I also cut the chipboard closet doors in the same edge design as the feet so it looks antique.

I made a small little treasure chest and attached it to the top of the closet.  When my grandson opens the lid he is surprised with the loose skeleton’s hands.  I wanted to give him the opportunity to touch something since he can’t open and touch the inside of the diorama.

I cut out part of a spider web and added a black bat onto it.  I also dangled the “Courageous” token over the entire embellishment.  I figured he might need a bit of positive reinforcement while imagining walking through this spooky setting.  I used the metal clock to simulate the harvest moon.  It’s almost midnight so use caution!

I hope you will create one of these boxes.  Jim did an amazing job designing this.  Thanks again Jim!

Wishing you all a safe and wonderful HALLOWEEN!