Halloween Celebration
How to Decorate a Sugar Skull
October 19th, 2008 in other crafts, patterns & designs, home decorating, holidays
Wendy Sloneker, contributor
3 users recommend
Sugar skull—so close!
Photo: Wendy Sloneker
Sugar skulls are a traditional part of Dia de los Muertos, the ritual celebrated on November 1–2 to honor deceased relatives. Here's how you can decorate your own sugar skull.
Materials
- Sugar skull (make your own from a mold—allowing for drying time—or order them undecorated)
- Traditional version: meringue powder, paste colors or food colors, stirrers, pastry piping bags
- Quick-to-play version: glitter, slick or puffy squeeze-bottle paints
- Optional decorations: sequins (and tweezers to place them), colored foil, feathers, crystals, googly eyes, wire motifs, beads, scissors for foil or decorating motifs
- Paper plates or sheets of waxed paper make for a great workspace for decorating your skulls
Warm Up
Test the paint or piping bag, and warm up your decorating hands with a series of dots, dashes, X's and O's . . . see how it feels before you commit to putting the decorations on your sugar skull. Use the paint or meringue paste as glue as well as color design and decoration.
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A close-up view of my latest skull. Here I used slick and puffy paints, which made for a quick project. Traditional meringue powder decorations are a fun and beautiful option if you have a bit more time. |
Dive in to That Mouth!
One of my own concerns was the design of the mouth: It was my own hang-up. There is an outline on the mouth of the skull that I couldn't decide whether to follow or blow outside of. In the end, I figured this is a fun opportunity to go outside the line that was given. Let's color outside the lines! I couldn't go that far outside my own lip line with lipstick—so I did it here.
A Case of the Weepies
It's quick to use glitter glues and squeezie paints, of course. But I must let you know that you may experience a sort of "weeping" of the sugar from using these products versus the traditional decorations. What this looked like for me was actual sugar tears, as the sugar became a bit transparent around the paint. I think it's because there is more water in the paint and glitter glues than in the meringue powder mixes. If you're using these products, my suggestion is to let it dry, then apply more in layers with drying time between.
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Due to the water content of the glues, a case of sugar weepies is part of the process if you want to do the quick-dec version of this project. The traditional method will not give you the weepies—very little water is used to mix the colors.
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It takes more time to mix up the colors for the traditional meringue powders, but it will dry much faster than the glues—and no weepies.
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Halloween Celebration
Whether you are creating a costume, designing decorations, or building your very own haunted house, find the inspiration for all of your Halloween needs here.
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Comments (2)
Posted: 9:00 pm on October 21st
Posted: 10:46 am on October 25th