A Little Nightmare for your Christmas

I was brainwashed with the world of Disney pretty early on in life. I remember carrying around a really ratty old Mickey doll all the time even though he was missing his nose and wanting Mickey everything up until I was 8. My Disney obsession came and went over the years, but once I returned to Disneyland as an teen and adult, it was back. I’m now at a point where I got to Disneyland at least once or twice a year and am slowly building my art collection with park inspired pieces. So when I saw this great Instructables post on making the Nightmare Before Christmas Haunted Mansion holiday wreath, I knew this would be on my list for holiday projects this season.

This tutorial is a bit modified from the Instructables post, but it’s pretty much the same idea. Also, here’s the reference image I used from the Haunted Mansion ride, but be creative!

What you’ll need:

Two bundles of garland (or one plain wreath and one garland)
Red Christmas bow
Wiring (I’m using jewelry wire, but you can use anything)
White cardboard – recommend something thick like matting board or poster boards
Wire cutters
Glue and glue gun
Yellow/Black crayons or paint

Step 1: Make a plain wreath out of the garland. I double up the garland and spread out the branches to make the wreath as wide as possible. Use the wiring and keep the garlands together.

Step 2: Use your second garland and cut two arms. My garland was folded in 4 segments so I ended up using 1 segment for each arm. Also, each end of the garland conveniently had an existing extra wire piece sticking out which was perfect for attaching to the wreath.

Step 3: Cut out the eyes and lots of teeth in various sizes. I tried to make the eyes more slanted and evil, but it’s really up to you! I used pastels to color the eyes yellow and gave it black pupils.

Step 4: Use the glue gun to attach the eyes and teeth. I attached everything while viewing the wreath from the front, but you can see what the back ended up looking like in the pic below.Step 5: Attach a bow!

Step 6: Find a good place to hang it! I decided to hang mine indoors and used thread and thumbtacks to keep everything in place. Hopefully your guests will get a good scare/laugh when they see it!