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Celebrate Day of the Dead with a festive homemade necklace!
Published 10.22.2009 | Permanent Link | Comments (8)
By Brenda Ponnay
Halloween isn't the only holiday that gets to have fun with dancing skeletons. There is another holiday called Dia de Los Muertos (or Day of the Dead in English) that is all about honoring the dead. Many of us struggle with the concept of death and spend a lot of time being sad about it, but that's not what this holiday is about. Dia de Los Muertos is a happy holiday. Families gather together to remember their loved ones who have passed, eat all their favorite foods, dance, and generally celebrate life and the afterlife.
It is quite popular to celebrate this holiday with dancing skeletons, marigolds and ofrendas (or altars) filled with pictures and mementos of the dearly-departed. For a kid-friendly take on this holiday we decided to make a pretty necklace out of salt-dough skull beads and bright orange tissue-paper marigolds. Both are quite easy and just a little bit silly.
To make the marigolds I used two different shades of orange tissue paper. I cut them into circles that were rough and irregular in shape. To make one flower you will need six circles. Make half of them small (1-2 inches) and the other half a little bit larger. Then with a piece of black twine and a needle I punctured the circles right in the center. I tied a knot on one side and left the other side with two pieces of twine hanging out. These two pieces I would later tie onto my necklace.
Then I crumpled the center circle up around my knot. That became the center bud of my flower. I crumpled the remaining circles up around that bud but looser so that they would gradually lay down like petals on a real marigold. Then I set them aside to make the salt-dough beads.
Making salt dough is really easy.
You will need the following ingredients to make the beads:
1/2 c. salt
1 c. of flour
1/2 c. of water
a cookie sheet
a toothpick
1. Preheat your oven to 250 F.
2. Mix the salt, flour and water together until the mixture is elastic and smooth. If dough is too sticky add flour; if it is too dry add water.
3. Pinch off small pieces and roll them into balls into the palm of your hand.
4. With beads or a toothpick make two small indentations for eyes.
5. Make some teeth by pushing the toothpick into the lower portions of the skull like so:
I pinched the bottom of the skull just a little to give it more of a human head shape, but this is optional. I let the kids make the skulls look any way they wanted.
Using the same toothpick, puncture a hole all the way through the skull from the side where the ears would be. This will be the hole that you will use later to thread the beads onto a necklace. Make sure you wiggle the toothpick around quite a bit so the holes are big. I found that many of the holes I made closed up during baking because I didn't make them big enough. But you don't want to make them too big so that they compromise the shape and sturdiness of your bead.
Place them on an ungreased cookie sheet and bake for two hours. I baked mine about 15 minutes short of two hours and I'm glad I did because I was able to poke some of my side holes through with a strong needle. If they had been baked completely, I wouldn't have been able to do that.
While we were waiting for our beads to bake, we colored our ofrenda coloring sheets and talked about the different people we know who have died. Ofrenda is the Spanish word for "offering" but it has nothing to do with worship. They are simply careful works of art that pay tribute to a deceased loved one. Usually ofrendas are collages or a collection of pictures and things that remind you of the person who has passed on.
You can create your own ofrenda, or you can download a coloring sheet here. The big circle in the center is for a photo or a drawing of the person you are remembering. The two circles at the bottom are for drawing things that they liked, or things that remind you of them.
My daughter is only three, so the only person she knows who has died is the lady who used to work at our laundromat. We miss her. She was a sweet old lady. To remember her we drew a bottle of laundry detergent in one circle and a purse in the other. She loved purses and was always commenting on mine. I also made one for my grandmother and colored it pink, her favorite color.
When the beads are done baking and have cooled, you can go ahead and paint your skulls with a dab of black paint in the eye holes and some quick swishes of black on the teeth. We used a toothpick to paint the teeth but I'm sure a small paintbrush would work well too.
Then we covered them with a decoupage sealer (we used Mod Podge). When everything was dry we strung them onto our twine interspersed with some wooden beads that I bought at a craft store. Then we tied our marigold flowers on wherever we fancied and tied the ends together to make a necklace.
I think they turned out splendidly. Very festive and not somber at all.
And we had plenty of spooky skulls left over for Halloween.
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About this column
This is a year-round Holiday column. Kids love Holidays. As parents we have come to appreciate how Holidays seem to help structure our lives. Plus, any excuse to have fun sounds good to us!
We'll admit it, now that we're parents, we secretly look for Holidays to celebrate and between National, Secular, Unofficial and Bizarre Holidays, we think there are enough days out there to keep us inspired every week.
This column will be a place where you can get inspiration for how to enjoy time with your kids. Crafting projects and ideas will be posted on Thursdays by our brilliant contributors (see below). Other fun ideas will be posted here throughout the week as the inspiration hits us!
About our Craft Contributors
Ellen Luckett Baker is the author of the long thread, a blog about handmade goods. She has always enjoyed making things, but the flexibility of staying at home with her two daughters along with the creative inspiration they provide has led her to craft on a daily basis. Combining her love of graphic design and sewing, she has created an Etsy shop selling machine embroidery designs and sewing patterns.
Ellen lives in Atlanta with her husband and two young daughters. She holds a B.A. in Art History and a Master's of Public Administration with a focus in Non-Profit Management.
Cindy Hopper was fortunate to be raised in a family who appreciated the arts. This background led to a Bachelor's Degree in Art Education. With a keen eye for design and color, Cindy has continued her love of art and is now passing her creative skills on to her three children. Cindy's family and friends are the beneficiaries of her passion for fun and meaningful creative projects. Cindy's personal blog, Skip to My Lou, has taken her love of a project to new levels. Postings keep the family busy -– from testing new recipes for holiday treats to designing and building floats for a neighborhood parade to making fabric rolls to hold crayons to creating themed parties. Cindy seems to have an unending supply of ideas for gifts, parties and rainy days.
Marie LeBaron is a 30 something stay at home mom in Utah. Before life as a mother, she graduated with a teaching degree in Early Childhood & Elementary Education, after which she taught four years of Kindergarten. After her first child was born, she decided to read books and sing silly songs at home. She misses the classroom, but she now gets to bring the fun and learning into her home and ours. You’ll see her kids a lot in these projects as they are her guinea pigs and for whom she's creative. You can follow more of her projects at her personal blog Make and Takes.
Brenda Ponnay is a stealthy secret agent who juggles parenthood to her adorable daughter by day and freelance graphic design by night. Whether it's painting, baking, drawing, making castles out of card board boxes or just doing the laundry with flair, Brenda Ponnay has finally discovered (at the ripe old age of thirty-six) that what really makes her happy is being creative every single day.
Brenda lives in Southern California with her husband, daughter, three cats and thirty-seven pet birds. You can read about all her crazy adventures on her personal blog: Secret Agent Josephine.
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Comments (8):
Melissa said:
Thank you for recognizing this holiday in Mexican culture! Even as a Mexican-American myself, I find myself getting sucked into Halloween and forgetting all about this wonderful day too. Anyways, what a fun and educational craft, I'll definitely be using this idea.
Posted on October 22, 2009 13:15
Katja of Skimbaco said:
What a great necklace, I love it!
Posted on October 22, 2009 15:44
BeachMama said:
Great necklaces. And they could be used both for La Dia des Muertes and Halloween.
Posted on October 22, 2009 21:55
julie adore said:
very good idea!!!
Posted on October 23, 2009 10:59
Amanda Formaro said:
This is really cute, love the tutorial too :) Cute little girl!
Posted on October 23, 2009 16:08
regina said:
Love, love, love this!!! WHat a wonderful idea. Thank you for sharing.
Posted on October 25, 2009 12:13
Cynthia said:
I love this necklace! I can't wait to try it with my kids. I love the idea of joyfully remembering people too.
Posted on October 25, 2009 16:00
Sue at Chocolate Cake Moments said:
I love this necklace idea. I'm always looking for other crafts or ways to get the kids excited about Dia de los Muertos. I went to high school in Mexico City and have always loved the respect and sense of fun around Dia de los Muertos and want to share it with my kids. Thanks for sharing.
Posted on November 10, 2009 18:29