Witch Necklace

$10 - $15 (based on 2025 prices) 
Makes one necklace

 

To kickstart the build on my full-standing witch, I decided to begin with a few simple decorative aspects: a hat, a necklace, and a shawl. These would give me the momentum and inspiration to work on the larger figure. For this prop, I drew inspiration from the necklace I made to accessorize the scarecrow costume for 2016’s haunted farm theme. Due to its simplicity, the necklace can be modified in a variety of ways to cater it to your needs as a decorative touch for either a costume or prop. For instance, you can enhance it further with the addition of chicken feathers or weathered beads 

• One yard of brown twine
• Three small plastic bones
• Two vinyl fingers
• Four vinyl mice
• One 8 oz. can of oil-based interior wood stain in Jacobean*
• One 8 oz. can of oil-based interior wood stain in red chestnut*
• One 2 oz. bottle of acrylic paint in flat beige*
• One 2 oz. bottle of acrylic paint in flat gray*
• One 2 oz. bottle of acrylic paint in flat red*
• One 2 oz. bottle of acrylic paint in flat pink*
• One 2 oz. bottle of acrylic paint in flat white*

1. On a newspaper-lined surface, apply three even coats of beige paint to the fingers and three even coats of white paint to the mice. Although I used three, you may want more or less based on your desired coverage.

2. Once the paint dries, detail the mice’s ears, feet, and tails with pink paint and apply smudges of the hue to the fingers, concentrating primarily on the tips and around the knuckles. Use your own skin patterns or those found in a medical textbook for reference. Also, I discovered that applying a small amount of paint to your thumb and index finger and rubbing it onto the prop works well.

3. Darken the mice’s eyes with red paint. Following this, paint the nails on both fingers white, allowing the paint to fully dry before smudging red paint around the cuticles. You may want to pat the excess with a paper towel to blend it into the pink.

4. Gently drybrush gray paint over the raised portions of the mice’s backs to give the fur further depth. For the fingers, cover the severed ends with several even coats of red paint and, using a brush with splayed bristles, apply a smattering of the hue up the sides. For additional detail, you can create random abrasions along the fingers.

5. To mute the pink on the mice’s ears, feet, and tails, pat a light layer of beige paint onto their surfaces. As with step two, it works best if you apply a small amount of paint to your fingers and use them to work the hue onto the prop.  

6. On a newspaper-lined surface in a well-ventilated area, paint the bones with the wood stain. I started with the red chestnut as a base and then dabbed Jacobean around the edges to darken them. This gave them a meaty appearance which made them look fresh.

7. Arrange the items in your desired order and use the twine to tie them all together. You can aim for symmetry as I did – evenly spacing each item and alternating their placement – or strive for chaos by clustering pieces together and leaving irregular spaces between them. Once you are done, leave about a foot of excess twine on either side. This will permit you to adjust the necklace’s size to fit around the wearer’s head.

*You will not use the entire bottle’s content for this project.